




I 
I 



r 



^ 





Class _.JL5^ 
Book lSBS. 



C^TightN". 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSm 



V 



/ 



BARNES ONE-TERM SERIES 



A BRIEF HISTORY 



OF 



ANCIENT PEOPLES 



WITH SOME ACCOUNT OF THEIR MONUMENTS, INSTITUTIONS, 
ARTS, MANNERS AND CUSTOMS 



BY 



JOEL DORMAN STEELE, Ph.D., E.G.S. 

1) 

AND 

ESTHER BAKER STEELE, LiT.D. 




NEW YORK • : . CINCINNATI • : • CHICAGO 

AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY 



LIBRARY of CONGRESS 

Two CoDies Received 

FEB 25 1909 

^ Copyright Entry 
CLASS O- XXc, No. 

COPY a. 



-5^^^^ 



^c,%3 



BAENES BRIEF HISTORY SERIES. 

i2M0. Illustrated. 

By Joel Dorman Steele and Esther B. Steele, 



BARNES BRIEF HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES, 

FOlt THE U8E OF SCHOOLS ANU FOB PKIVATE READING. 

BARNES BRIEF HISTORY OF FRANCE, for the Use 

or Schools and for Private Reading. 

•BARNES BRIEF HISTORY OF GREECE, with Select 
Readings from Standard authors. 

BARNES BRIEF HISTORY OP ROME, with Select 
Readings from Standard Authors. 

•BARNES BRIEF HISTORY OF ANCIENT PEOPLES, 

for the Use of Schools and for Private Reading. 

BARNES BRIEF HISTORY OF MEDIEVAL AND 
MODERN PEOPLES, for the Use of Schools and 
FOR Private Reading. 

BARNES BRIEF GENERAL HISTORY, AncIent. Me- 
dieval, and Modern Peoples. 



Copyright, 1881, bij A. S. Barnes & Co 
Copyright, 1909, by Esther Baker Steele. 



p. ij. 






J 

"V 






^ 













THE plan of the Barnes Brief History Series has been 
thoroughly tested in the books already issued, and their 
extended use and approval are evidence of its general ex- 
cellence. In this work the political history, which occu- 
pies most if not all of the ordinary school-text, is condensed 
to the salient and essential facts, in order to give room for 
some account of the literature, religion, architecture, char- 
acter, and habits of the different nations. Surely, it is as 
important to know something about Plato as all about Ceesar ; 
to learn how the ancients wrote their books as how they 
fought their battles; and to study the virtues of the old 
Germans and the dawn of our own customs in English 
home-life, as to trace the petty squabbles of Alexander's 
successors or the intricacies of the Wars of the Roses. 

The general divisions on '^Civilization" and '^Manners 
and Customs'' were prepared by Mrs. J. Doriian Steele. 

The chapters on "Manners and Customs" and '^ Scenes in 
Real Life" represent the people of history as men and women 
subject to the same wants, hopes, and fears, as ourselves, 
and so bring the distant past near to us. The "Scenes," 
which are intended only for reading, are the result of a 
careful study of the monuments in foreign museums, of the 
ruins themselves, and of the latest authorities on the do- 



IV PREFACE. 

mestic life of the peoples of other lands and times. Though 
intentionally written in a semi-romantic style, they are 
accurate pictures of what might have occurred, and some 
of them are simple transcriptions of the details sculptured 
in Assyrian alabaster, or painted on Egyptian walls. 

It should be borne in mind that the extracts here made 
from "The Sacred Books of the East" are not comprehen- 
sive specimens of their style and teachings, but only gems 
selected from a mass of matter, much of which is absurd, 
meaningless, and even revolting. It has not seemed best 
to cumber a book like this with selections conveying no 
moral lesson. ' 

The numerous cross-references, the abundant dates in 
parentheses, the blackboard analyses, the pronunciation of 
the names in the index, the genealogical tables, the choice 
reading references at the close of each general subject, and 
the novel "Historical Recreations'^ in the appendix, will be 
of service to both teacher and pupil. An acknowledgment 
of indebtedness in the preparation of this history is hereby 
made to the works named in the reading references. 

It is hoped that a large class of persons who desire to 
know something about the progress of historic criticism as 
well as the discoveries resulting from recent archaeological 
excavations, but who have no leisure to read the ponderous 
volumes of Brugsch, Layard, Grote, Mommsen, Rawhnson, 
Ihne, Lanfrey, Froude, Martin, and others, will find this 
little book just what they need. 




PAGE 

1. Inteoduction 9 

8. Egypt 15 

8. Babylonia and Assyria 45 

4. Phcenicia 73 

5. JUDEA 80 

6. Media and Persia 88 

7. India 105 

8. China 109 

9. Greece ,...113 

10. EoME , 203 

11. Appendix: 

1. The Seven Wonders of the "World. * i 

2. The Seven Wise Men i 

3. Historical Recreations ii 

4. Index zi 



LIST OF MAPS. 

PAGE 

Map of Early Races and Nations 11 

Map of Ancient Egypt 16 

Map of the Assyrian and Persian Empires 45 

Map of Ph(enicia and Judea in Solomon's Time 74 

Map of Canaan and the Wilderness 81 

Map of Greece and her Colonies 113 

Map of Hellas in the Heroic Age 118 

Map of Gtreece in the Time of the Persian Wars 125 

Map of the Plain op Marathon 126 

Map of the Vicinity of Thermopyl^ 130 

Map of the Vicinity of Athens and Salamis 135 

Map illustrating the Peloponnesian War 142 

Map of the Empire of Alexander 153 

Map of the Roman Empire and its Provinces. 203 

Map of the Early Tribes and Cities of the Italian Pen- 
insula 210 

Map illustrating the Punic Wars 228 

Map of the Divisions of Italia to the Time of Augustus > 255 
Map or Plan of Ancient Rome 299 



ANCIENT PEOPLES. 



Examine History, for it is " Philosophy teaching by Experience." 

Carlyle, 



" Truth comes down to us from the past, as gold is washed down 
from the mountains of the Sierra Nevada, in minute but precious 
particles— the debris of the centuries." 



BLACKBOARD ANALYSIS. 



1' Egyp.- 
tians. 



1. Political 

HiSTORYo 



1. Origin. 

2. Old Empire. 

3. Middle Empire. 

4. New Empire. 

5. Decline. 



Civiliza- 
tion. 



3. Manners 
AND Customs, 



1. Society. 



2. Writing. 



3. Literature. 



King. 

Priests. 

Military Class. 

Lower Classes. 

Hieroglyphics. 

Papyrus. 

Book of the Dead. 

Phtahhotep's Book. 

Miscellaneous Books. 



2. Babylo- 
nians and 
AssY^ans^ 



4. Summary. 

5. Chronology. 

6. Reading References 
1, 
2, 

Political J 3, 

History. | 4 

5, 



4. Education. 

5. Monuments and Art. 

6. Practical Arts and Inventions. 

1. General Character. 

2. Religion. 

3. Embalming. 

4. Burial. 

il. Pyramid Building. 
2. A Lord of the IVth Dynasty 
3. Amenemhe Illd. 
4. A Theban Dinner Party. 



Civiliza- 
tion. 



3. Manners 
.AND Customs. 



3. PhtEni- 
cians. 

4i Hebrews, 

5. Medes 

and 
Persians, 

6. Hindoos. 

7. Chinese. 



1. Political History. 

2. Civilization. 

1. Political History. 

2. Civilization. 

1. Political History. 

2. Civilization. 

3. Manners and Customs. 

1. Political History. 

2. Civilization. 

1. Political History. 

2. Civilization. 



Origin. 
Chaldea. 
Assyria. 

Names of Kings. 
Babylonia. 
Names of Kings. 

1. Society. 

2. Writing. 

3. Literature. 

4. Monuments and Art. 

5. Pi'actical Arts and Inventions. 

1. General Character. 

2. Religion. 

3. Curious Customs. 

{1. A Chaldean Home. 
2. A Morning in Nineveh. 
3. A Royal Lion Hunt. 
4, Asshurbanipal going to War. 



[The subdivisions of these 
general topics may be filled in 
from the titles of the paragraphs 
in the text, as the student pro- 
ceeds.] 



8. Grecians. 



9. Romans, 



1. Political 
History. 



Geographical and Early History. 

Sparta. 

Athens. 

Persian Wars. 

Age of Pericles. 

Peloponnesian War. 

Lacedeemon and Theban Rule. 

Macedon. 

Alexander's Successors. 



2. Civilization. 

3, Manners and Customs. 

1. Political History. 

2. Civilization. 

3. Manners and Customs, 








GREAT HALL OF KAKNAK. 



History is a record of 
what man has done. It 
treats of the rise and 
growth of the different 
nations which have ex- 
isted, of the deeds of their 
great men, the manners 
and customs of their peo- 
ples, and the part each 
nation has taken in the 
progress of the world.. 

Dates are reckoned 
from the birth of Christ, 



the central point in history. Time before that event is 



10 ANCIENT HISTORY. 

denoted as b. c. j time after, a. d. {Anno Domini, in the year 
of our Lord).^ 

Three Divisions. — History is distinguished as Ancient, 
Mediaeval, and Modern. Ancient history extends from the 
earliest time to the fall of the Roman Empire (476 a. d.) ; 
Medigeval, or the history of the Middle ages, covers about 
a thousand years, or to the close of the 15th century j and 
Modern history continues to the present time. 

The only Historic Race is the Caucasian, the others 
having done httle worth recording. It is usually divided 
into three great branches : the Ar'yan, the Semit'ic, and 
the Hamit'ic. The first of these, which includes the Per- 
sians, the Hindoos, and nearly all the European nations, is 
the one to which we belong. It has always been noted for 
its intellectual vigor. The second embraces the Assyrians, 
the Hebrews, the Phoenicians, and the Arabs. It has been 
marked by religious fervor, and has given to the world the 
three faiths — Jewish, Christian, and Mohammedan — which 
teach the worship of one God. The third branch ^ includes 
the Chaldeans and the Egyptians. It has been remarkable 
for its massive architecture. 

Ancient Aryan Nation. — Asia was probably the birth- 
place of mankind. In a time far back of aU history there 
lived in Bactria (map, p. 11) a nation that had made con- 
siderable progress in civilization. The people called them- 

1 This method of reckoning was introduced by Exiguus, a Roman abbot, near the 
middle of the 6th century. It is now thought that the birth of Christ occurred about 
four years earlier than the time fixed in our chronology. The Jews still date from 
the Creation, and the Mohammedans usually from the Hegira (p. 326), 622 A. D. 

2 The Chaldeans were a mixed people, and are variously classed as Semitic, Hami tic, 
or Turanian. Those nations of Europe and Asia that are not Aryan or Semitic are 
frequently termed Turanian. This branch would then include the Mongols, Chinese, 
Japanese, Turks, Tartars, Lapps, Finns, Magyars, etc. Iran (e'-rahn), or Aria, the 
old name of Persia (the "land of light"), is opposed toTuran, the barbarous region 
around (the "land of darkness"). The Aryan (Indo-European) and Semitic languages 
have certain resemblances, but the so-called Turanian dialects bear little resemblance 
to one another. 



12 ANCIENT HISTORY. 

selves Aryas or Aryans, — those who go straight or upward. 
They dwelt in houses, plowed the soil, ground their grain 
in mills, rode in vehicles, worked certain metals, calcu- 
lated up to 100, and had family ties, a government, and a 
religion,^ 

Aryan Dispersion. — How long our Aryan forefathers 
lived united in their early home, we have no means of know- 
ing. As they increased in numbers, they would naturally 
begin to separate. When they moved into distant regions, 
the bond of union would become weaker, their language 
would begin to vary, and so the seeds of new tongues and 
new nations would be sown. To the south-east these Aryan 
emigrants pushed into Persia and northern India; to the 
west they gradually passed into Europe, whence, in a later 
age, they settled Australia and America. In general, they 
drove before them the previous occupants of the land. The 
peninsulas of Greece and Italy were probably earhest occu- 
pied. Three successive waves of emigration seem to have 
afterward swept over central Europe. First came the Celts 
(Kelts), then the Teutons (Germans), and finally the Slaves.^ 
Each of these appears to have crowded the preceding one 
farther west, as we now find the Celts in Ireland and Wales, 
and the Slaves in Russia and Poland. 



1 These views are based on similarities of language. About 600,000,000 people— half 
the population of the globe— speak Aryan languages. These contain many words 
which have a family likeness. Thus, night, in Latin, is noct; in German, nacht; and 
in Greek, nykt. TJiree,\n Latin, is tres ; in Greek, treis ; and in Sanscrit (the aucieut 
language of the Hindoos), tri. All such words are supposed to have belonged to one 
original speech, and to suggest the life of that parent race. Thus we infer tliat the 
Aryans had a regular government, since words meaning king or ruler are the 
same in Sanscrit, Latin, and English ; and that tliey had a family life, since the words 
meaning father, mother, brother, sister, etc., are the same in tliese kindred tongues. 
Some recent theories discredit successive western migrations, place the primitive 
Aryan home in Europe, and argue that the Indo-Iranians emigrated from Europe 
to Asia. 

2 This word originally meant " glorious," but came to have its present signification 
because at one time there were in Europe so many bondsmen of Slavonic birth. 



INTRODUCTION. 



13 



The following table shows the principal peoples which have 
descended from the ancient races: — 



1. HAMITIC RACE 



2. SEMITIC BACE. 



•{ 



3. ABYAN BACE. 



Egyptians. 
Chaldeans (?). 

Assyrians. 
Phcenicians. 
Hebrews. 
Arabs. 



MEDES AND PERSIANS. 
HINDOOS. 



. « GREEKS. 

s e 

'^l ROMANS . 



Celts 



■•••J 



Teutons 



SLAVES . 



French. 
Italians. 
Spaniards. [ 
Portuguese. J 

Welsh. 
Irish. 

Highland Scots. 
Britons. 

Germans. 

Dutch. 

English. 

Swedes. 

Danes. 

Norwegians. 



Romanic {Romance) 
Reoples. 




Commencement of Civil History. — History begins 
on the banks of the Nile, the Tigris, and the Euphrates.^ 
There the rich alluvial soil, the genial climate, and the abun- 
dant natural products of the earth, offered every inducement 



1 " The Nile valley and the Tigris- Euphrates basin were two great oases in the 
vast desert which extended from west to east very nearly across the eastern hemi- 
sphere. These favored spots were not only the two centers of early civilization, but ' 
they were rivals of each other. They were connected by roads fit for the passage of 
vast armies. Whenever there was an energetic ruler along the Nile or the Tigris- 
Euphrates, he at once, as if by an inevitable law, attempted the conquest of his com- 
petitor for the control of western Asia. In fact, the history of ancient as well as 
modern Asia is little more than one continuous record of political struggles between 
Egypt and Mesopotamia, ending only when Europe entered the lists, as in the time 
of Alexander the Great and the Crusaders." 



14 ANCIENT HISTORY. 

to a nomadic people to settle and commence a national 
life. Accordingly, amid the obscurity of antiquity, we catch 
sight of Memphis, Thebes, Nineveh, and Babylon,— the ear- 




liest cities of the world. The traveler of to-day, wandering 
among their ruins, looks upon the records of the infancy 
of civilized man. 



EGYPT. 



1. THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 

The Origin of the civilization which grew up on the 
banks of the Nile is uncertain. The earhest accounts repre- 
sent the country as divided into nomes, or provinces, and 
having a regular government. About 2700^ B. c. Menes 
(me'-neez), the half -mythical founder of the nation, is said 
to have conquered Lower Egypt and built Memphis, which 
he made his capital. Succeeding him, down to the conquest 
of Egypt by the Persians under Camby'ses (527 B. c), there 
were twenty-six dynasties of Pharaohs, or kings. The his- 
tory of this long period of over 2000 years is divided into 
that of the Old, Middle, and New Empires. 

1. The Old Empire (2700-2080 b. c.).~During this 

Geographical Questions.— liocate the capitals of the five early kingdoms of Egypt : 
This, Elephantine (fan' te-na), Mem'phis, Heracleop'olis, Thebes ; the Pyramids of 
Gizeh ; the Nile's first cataract. Why is southern Egypt called Upper ? Describe 
Egypt. Ans. A flat valley, 2 to 10 miles wide, skirted by low, rocky hills ; on the 
west, the desert; on the east, a mountainous region rich in quarries, extending to the 
Red Sea. Through this narrow valley, for 600 miles, the Nile rolls i' s muddy waters 
northward. About 100 miles from the Mediterranean the hills i icede, the valley 
widens, and the Nile divides into two outlets,— the Damietta and Rosetta. These 
branches diverge until they enter the sea, 80 miles apart. Ancientl there were seven 
branches, and the triangular space i)hey inclosed was called the Delta, from the 
Greek letter A. As the Nile receives no tributary for the last 1100 miles of its course 
it becomes smaller toward its mouth. 

1 Before the discoveries of the last century, the chief sources of information on 
Egypt were (1) Herodotus, a Greek historian who traveled along the Nile about 
450 B. C. ; (2) Diodo'ms Sic'ulus, another Greek historian, who visited Egypt in the 
1st century b. c, ; and (3) Man'etho, an Egyptian priest (3d century B. c.) of whose 
history only fragments now remain. Manetho, who compiled his accounts from 
archives preserved in the Egyptian temples, has been the main authority on 
chronology. How many dynasties were contemporaneous is a subject of dispute 



EGYPT. 







ANCIENT 
EGYPT 

Scale QfSng.MUes 



60 

J.WELL8 DEL. 



^ T H I 7 O P I A 



new epocli began in Egyptian history, 
claimed all the district watered by the 



epocli the princi 

pal interest clusters 
about the IV*^ or 
Pyramid dynasty, 
so called because its 
chief monarchs built 
the three great pyra- 
mids at Gizeh (ghe'- 
zeh). The best- 
known of these kings 
was Khu'fu, termed 
Cheops (ke'-ops) by 
Herodotus. In time, 
Egypt broke up into 
kingdoms, Memphis 
lost its preeminence, 
and Thebes became 
the favorite capital. 
2. The Middle 
Empire (2080 b. c- 
1525 B. c.).— When 
the hundred-gated 
city, Thebes, rose to 
sovereign power, a 
The XIP^ dynasty 
Nile, and under its 



among Egyptologists, who differ over 3000 years— from 5702 B. c. to 2691 B. c— on the 
date for Menes. As the Egyptians themselves had no continuous chronology, hut 
reckoned dates from the ascension of each king, the monuments furnish little help. 
Of the five recovered lists of kings, only one attempts to give the length of their 
respective reigns, and this is in 164 fragments. All early Egyptian dates are there- 
fore extremely uncertain, although most Egyptologists differ less than 200 years on 
those following the foundation of the New Empire. The Egyptian Exploration 
Fund (founded 1883) and the Archaeological Survey (1890) are now systematically 
investigating monuments and papyri. In this book, what is called the "Short Chro- 
laology" has been followed. 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 17 

great kings, the Sesorta'sens and the Amenem'hes, Ethiopia 
was conquered. To this dynasty belong the famous Lake 
Moeris and the Labyrinth (p. 39). The briUiant XIP^ 
dynasty was followed by the weak XIII"\ The divided 
country invited attack, and the Hyksos (" shepherd kings "), 
a rude, barbarous race that had already conquered Lower 
Egypt, finally overran the whole region, and ruled it for 400 
years. When at last they were di'iven out, they left to 
Egypt a strong, centralized government. 

3. The New Empire (1525-527 b. c.).— The native 
kings having been restored to the throne, Egypt became a 
united people, with Thebes for the capital. Then followed 
a true national life of 1000 years. The XVIII"^ and XIX*^ 
dynasties exalted Egypt to the height of its glory. Thoth- 
fues I. (tot'-meez) began a system of great Asiatic expedi 
tions, which lasted 500 years. Thothmes III.,^ the Egyptian 
Alexander the Great, was a magnificent warrior-king. In 
the sculptures, Nineveh and Babylon pay him tribute ; 
while his ships, manned by Phoenician sailors, sweep the 
Mediterranean. The Great Temple of Karnak (p. 26) was 
largely built by him. Am'imoph III. was also a famous war- 
rior and builder. Among his structures there remains the 
Vocal Memnon, which was said to sing when kissed by the 
rising sun. Khii-en-A'ten, the heretic king, rejected the The- 
ban gods for the one-god {Aten) sun-worship of his foreign 
mother. He founded a new capital (now Tel-el-Amarna 
ruins), but neither capital nor religion long survived him. 
Seti (Mineptah I.) subdued Mesopotamia, and built the Great 
HaU of Columns at Karnak. At an early age his son, 

1 In 1881, between 30 and 40 royal munimiea, Including those of Thothmes III., 
Seti I., and Rameses II., were found in a concealed mummy pit near Thebes. The 
oflficial records on the cases and bandages show that tliese precious relics had been 
moved from tomb to tomb, probably for safety, until at some crisis they had been 
hurriedly deposited here. The great Barneses had thus been shifted many times, 



18 EGYPT. 

Ram'eses II., was made joint king with him, and they reigned 
together until Mineptah's death. Barneses II., the Sesostris 
the Great of the Greek historians, carried his conquering 
arms far into Africa. The greatest builder^ of aU the 
Pharaohs, his gigantic enterprises exhausted the nation. 
Annual slave-hunting expeditions were made into Ethiopia ; 
prisoners of war were lashed into service 5 and the lives of 
the unhappy Hebrews were made " bitter with hard bondage, 
in mortar, and in brick" (Exod. i. 14). He founded a library 
inscribed " The Dispensary of the Soul," and gathered about 
him many men of genius, making his time a golden age of 
art and Hterature. 

The Decline of Egypt began with the XX*^ dynasty, 
when it was no longer able to retain its vast conquests. The 
tributary peoples revolted, and the country was subdued in 
turn by the Ethiopians and the Assyrians (p. 49). After 
nearly a century of foreign rule, PsammeticMis of the XXVI"^ 
dynasty threw off the Assyrian yoke, and restored the Egyp- 
tian independence. This monarch, by employing Greek 



only to land at last in the Gizeh museum, where " his uncoveretl face now lies for 
the whole world to gaze upon." In 1891, over 60 mummies of the same period 
(XVI Ith to XXIst dynasties) were found in another tomb near the first. These had 
escaped the eyes of modern trafficking thieves, and were found as they were left over 
3000 years ago. In 1892, Khueu-Aten's tomb was uncovered. His enemies had shat- 
tered his sarcophagus, torn his mummy- wrappings to shreds, and effaced every token 
of his hated religion. Babylonian clay-tablet dispatches (p. 65) dug up in 1887 at Tel- 
el-Amarua fix Khu-en-Aten's reign at about 1430 B. c. 

1 Though most of the monuments in Egypt bear his name, it is often inscribed 
over the erased cartouch (p. 22) of a previous king One of his first acts after Seti's 
death was to complete the unfinished temple of Ab'ydus, where his father was buried. 
A long inscription which he placed at the entrance, ostensibly in praise of the de- 
parted Seti, is a good example of his own boastfulness and habit of self-glorification. 
He says, "The most beautiful thing to behold, the best thing to hear, is a child with 
a thankful breast, whose heart beats for his father. Wherefore my heart urges me to 
do what is good for Mineptah. I will cause them to talk forever and eternally of his 
son, who has awakened his name to life." The filial zeal of Rameses so declined in 
his later years, that, true to his ruling propensity, he chiseled out his father's name 
and memorials in many places on the temple walls, and substituted his own in their 
place. Rameses II. is supposed to be the Pharaoh of tlie Israelitish Oppression, 
and his son, Mineptah II., to be the Pharaoh of the Exodus. 



THE CIVILIZATION. 19 

troops, so offended the native warriors that 200,000 of them 
mutinied, and emigrated to Ethiopia. His successor, Neclio 
(Pharaoh-Necho of the Scriptures), maintained a powerful 
fleet. Under his orders the Phoenician ships rounded the 
Cape of Good Hope.^ 

The internal prosperity of Egypt still continued, as is 
shown by the magnificent monuments of this period ; but 
the army was filled with mercenaries, and the last of the 
Pharaohs fell an easy prey to the fierce-fighting Persians 
under Cambyses. Egypt, like Babylon (p. 51), was now 
reduced to a Persian province governed by a satrap. 

2. THE CIVILIZATION. 

Egyptian Society was divided into distinct classes, so that 
ordinarily no man could rise higher than the station in which 
he was born.2 The priestly and military classes, which included 
the king, princes, and all men of rank, were far above the others. 

The King received the most exalted titles, and his authority was 
supposed to come direct from the gods. The courtiers, on approach- 
ing him, fell prostrate, rubbing the ground with their noses ; some- 
times, by his gracious consent, they were permitted to touch his 
sacred knee.^ That he might be kept pure, he was given from 
childhood only the choicest and most virtuous companions, and no 

1 Twice during this voyage, says Herodotus, the crews, fearing a want of food, 
landed, drew their ships on shore, sowed grain, and waited for a harvest. The pupil 
will notice that this was over 2000 years before Vasco da Gama (Hist. U. S., p. 41), to 
whom is generally accorded the credit of first circumnavigating Africa. 

2 There seems to have been an exception in favor of talented scribes. " Neither 
descent nor family hampered the rising career of the clever. Many a, monument con- 
secrated to the memory of some nobleman who had held high rank at court has the 
simple but laudatory inscription, ' His ancestors were unknown people.' "—Brugsch. 
Royal preferment was also without restriction. 

3 " When they had come before the king, their noses touched the ground, and 
their feet lay on the ground for joy; they fell down to the ground, and with their 
hands they prayed to the king. Thus they lay prostrate and touching the earth 
before the king, speaking thus : ' We are come before thee, the lord of heaven, lord 
of the earth, sun, life of the whole world, lord of time, creator of the harvest, dis- 
penser of breath to all men, animator of the gods, pillar of heaven, threshold of the 
earth, weigher of the balance of the two worlds,'" etc. (Inscription of Rameses II. 
at Abydus). 



20 



EGYPT. 



hired servant was allowed to approach his person. His daily con- 
duct was governed by a code of rules laid down in the sacred 
books, which prescribed not only the hourly order and nature of 
his occupations, but limited even the kind and quantity of his 
food. He was never suffered to forget his obligations ; and one 
of the offices of the High Priest at the daily sacrifice was to remind 
him of his duties, and, by citing the good works of his ancestors, 
to impress upon him the nobility of a well-ordered life. After 
death he was worshiped with the gods. 

The Priests were the richest, ths most powerful, and the only 
learned body of the country. They were not limited to sacred 

offices, and in their caste comprised all 
the mathematicians, scientists, lawyers, 
and physicians of the land. Those 
priests who " excelled in virtue and wis- 
dom " were initiated into the holy mys- 
teries, — a privilege which they shared 
only with the king and the prince-royal. 
Among the priesthood, as in the other 
classes, there were marked distinctions 
of rank. The High Priests held the 
most honorable station. Chief among 
them was the Prophet, who offered 
sacrifice and libation in the temple, 
wearing as his insignia a leopard-skin 
over his robes. The king himself often 
performed the duties of this office. The 
religious observances of the priests were 
rigid. They had long fasts, bathed 
twice a day and twice in the night, and 
every third day were shaven from head to foot, the most devout 
using water which had been tasted by the sacred Ibis. Beans, pork, 
fish, onions, and various other articles of diet, were forbidden to 
them ; and on certain days, when a religious ceremony compelled 
every Egyptian to eat a fried fish before his door, the priests burned 
theirs instead. Their dress was of linen : woolen might be used for 
an outer, but never for an inner garment, nor could it be worn into / 
a temple. The influence of the priests was immense, since they not 
only ruled the living, but were supposed to have power to open and 
shut the gates of eternal bliss to the dead. They received an ample 
income from the state, and had one third of the land free of tax,— 




EGYPTIAN PROPHET. 
(From Monument at Thebes.) 



THE CIVILIZATION. 



21 



an inheritance which they claimed as a special gift from the god- 
dess Isis. 

The Military Class also possessed one third of the land, each 
soldier's share being about eight acres. The army, which numbered 
410,000 men, was well disciplined and thoroughly organized. It 
comprised archers, spearmen, swordsmen, clubmen, and shngers. 
Each soldier furnished his own equipments, and held himself in 
constant readiness for duty. He wore a metal coat of mail and a 
metal or cloth helmet, and carried a large shield made of ox-hide 
drawn over a wooden frame. The chariots, of which great use was 




EGYPTIAN WAR CHARIOT (THEBES). 

made in war, were sometimes richly ornamented and inlaid with 
gold. The king led the army, and was often accompanied by a 
favorite lion. 

Lower Classes. — All the free population not belonging to the 
priesthood or the military was arbitrarily classified ; each trade or 
occupation having its own rank in the social scale, and inhabiting 
a certain quarter in the town, — a custom still observed in Cairo. 
Scribes and architects, whose profession gave them access to 
temples and palaces, and who had thus a chance to win royal favor, 
naturally stood highest. Swine-herds were the most despised of all 
men ; the Egyptian, like the Hebrew, Mohammedan, and Indian, 
considering the pig an unclean animal. Swine-herds were forbid- 
den to enter a temple. As the entire land of Egypt was owned by 



22 EGYPT. 

the king, the priests, and the soldiers, the lower classes could hold 
no real estate; but they had strongly marked degrees of importance, 
depending upon the relative rank of the trade to which they were 
born, and their business success. According to Herodotus, no 
artisan could engage in any other employment than the one to 
which he had been brought up. He also tells us that every man 
was obliged to have some regular means of subsistence, a written 
declaration of which was deposited periodically with the magis- 
trate. A false account or an unlawful business was punished by 
death. 

Writing. — Hieroglyphics'^ (sacred sculptures). — The earliest 

Egyptian writing was a series of object pictures analogous to that 

still used by the North American Indians (Brief Hist. U. S., p. 13). 

a _.— ^ ^ Gradually this primitive system 

^ I ?!^ Ife. ylj ^ (^^ was altered and abbreviated into 

^ • * ^ • • -^ ^^ (1) hieratic (priestly) writing, 

THE NAME OF EGYPT IN tho form lu wMch most Egyp- 

HiEROGLYPHics. tlau litcraturc is written, and 

which is read by first resolving it into the original hieroglyphs ; and 

(2) demotic (writing of the people), in which all traces of the original 

pictures are lost. During these changes many meanings became 

attached to one sign, so that the same hieroglyph might represent 

an idea, the symbol of an idea, or an abstract letter, syllable, or word. 

An Egyptian scribe used various devices to explain his meaning. 

To a hieroglyphic word or syllable he would append one or more 

of its letters ; then, as the letter-signs had different meanings, he 

1 So called by the Greeks, who thought them to be mystic religious symbols 
understood only by the priests. Neither the Greeks nor Komans attempted to 
dlecipher them. The discovery of the Rosetta stone (1799) furnished the first clew to 
their reading. A French engineer, while digging intrenchments on the site of an old 
temple near the Rosetta mouth of the Nile (Brief Hist. France, p. 229), unearthed 
a black basalt tablet inscribed in three languages,— hieroglyphic, demotic, and 
Greek. It proved to be a decree made by the priests in the time of Ptolemy V. 
(196 B. c), whom it styled the "god Epiphanes," increasir.g his divine honors, and 
ordering that the command should be engraved in the three languages, and placed in 
all the chief temples. By a comparison of the Greek and Egyptian texts, a principle 
of interpretation was finally established. Hieroglyphics had hitherto been supposed 
to represent only ideas or symbols. Twenty-three years after the discovery of the 
Rosetta stone, the great French scholar Frangois CharapoUion announced that they 
express both ideas and sounds. The Egyptians inclosed their royal names and titles 
in an oval ring or cartouch. Out of the four cartouches, r^^^^^^jTj Ptolemaios, 

&n^V»] | Berenike, (^^^a\^VCJ Kleopatra, and ^^^^^ 

Alexandros, Champollion obtained a partial alphabet, which was completed by 
subsequent analyses. 



THE CIVILIZATION. 23 

would add a picture of some object that would suggest the intended 
idea. Thus, for the word tread "^ ^ he would write the 
syllable ^^ [Aq) then its complement •* (Q) and finally, as 
a determinative, give the picture of a loaf ((^ ). Cue would 
suppose that the form of the loaf would itself have been sufficient, 
but even that had several interpretations. In like manner the 

scribe appended the determinative ^R not only to words sig- 
nifying actions of the mouth, as eating, laughing, speaking, etc., but 
to those of the thought, as knowing, judging, deciding. To under- 
stand hieroglyphics, a knowledge of the peculiar ideas of the Egyp- 
tians is also necessary. It is easy to see that ^JL means worship, 

and ^jSj crime; but we should hardly interpret Im^ as son, 

or '^1 as mother, unless we knew that geese were believed to 

possess a warm filial nature, and all vultures to be females. Besides 
these and other complications in hieroglyphic writing, there was no 
uniform way of arranging sentences. They were written both hori- 
zontally and perpendicularly ; sometimes part of a sentence was 
placed one way, and part the other j sometimes the words read from 
right to left, sometimes from left to right, and sometimes they were 
scattered about within a given space without any apparent order. 

Papyrus. — Books were written and government records kept on 
papyrus i (hence, paper) rolls. These were generally about ten 
inches wide and often one hundred and fifty feet long. They were 
written upon with a frayed reed dipped into black or red ink. As 
the government had the monopoly of the papyrus, it was very costly. 

1 The papyrus, or paper reed, which flourished in ancient times so luxuriantly that 
it formed jungles along the banks of the Nile, is no longer found in Egypt. ("The 
paper reeds by the brooks, by the mouth of the brooks, . . . shall wither, be driven 
away, and be no more."— Isa. xix. 7.) It had a large, three-sided, tapering stem, two 
to three inches broad at the base. The reed was prepared for use by peeling off the 
smooth bark, and cutting the inner mass of white pith lengthways into thin slices, 
which were laid side by side witli their edges touching one another. A second layer 
having been placed transversely upon the first, and the whole sprinkled with the 
muddy Nile water, a heavy press was applied which united them into one mass. It 
was th«n dried, and cut into sheets of the required size. Papyrus was in use until the 
end of the 7th century A. D., when it was superseded by parchment (prepared skins). 
The latter was alEo used in Egypt at a very early period ; and though it is generally 
supposed to have been invented by Eumenes, King of Pergamus, in the 2d century 
B. c, "records written upon skins and kept in the temple " are mentioned in the 
^uae-of the XVIII"' dynasty, 1200 years before Eiimenes (p. 156). 



24 



EGYPT. 




For common purposes 

therefore, the people 

used bits of broken 

pottery, stones, boards, 

the bark and leaves of 

trees, and the shoulder- 
bones of animals. 
Literature.— 5oo^ of the Bead.—Uhe most cele- " '"'^^ 
brated Egyptian book is the " Book of the Manifestation to Light," 
often called the " Book of the Dead." It is a ritual for the use 
of the soul in its journeys i after death, and a copy more or less 



1 After death the soul was supposed to descend into the lower world, where, in the 
great Hall of Justice, before Osiris and his forty-two assessors (p. 34), it was weighed 
In the infallible scales of Truth. The soul's defense before Osiris is elaborately de- 
tailed in the Ritual. If accepted, it became itself an "Osiris," and roamed the 
universe for three thousand years, always maintaining a mysterious connection with 
its mummied body, which it visited from time to time. In its wanderings it assumed 
different forms at will, and the Ritual gives instructions by means of which it could 
become a hawk, heron, lotus-flower, serpent, crocodile, etc., all emblems of Deity. 
Various incantations are also given by which it could vanquish the frightful mon- 
sters that assailed it in the nether world. The Soul, the Shadow, and the Ka were at 
last reunited to the body in a blissful immortality. The Ka (p. 38) was a man's 
mysterious " double," an ethereal counterpart distinct from the soul, which dwelt in 



THE CIVILIZATION. 25 

complete, according to the fortune of the deceased, was inclosed in 
the mummy-case. This strange book contains some sublime pas- 
sages, and many of its chapters date from the earliest antiquity. 
As suggestive of Egyptian morals, it is interesting to find in the 
soul's defense before Osiris such sentences as these : — 

" I have not been idle ; I have not been intoxicated ; I have not told secrets ; I 
have not told falsehoods ; I have not defrauded; I have not slandered; I have not 
caused tears ; I have given food to the hungry, drink to the thirsty, and clothes to 
the naked." 

Phtah-Tio'tep's Boole. — Good old Prince Phtah-hotep, son of a 
king of the V*^ dynasty, wrote a moral treatise full of excellent 
advice to the young people of 4000 years ago. This book, now 
preserved in Paris, is believed to be the oldest in the world. The 
following extracts are noticeable : — 

On Filial Obedience. "The obedient son shall grow old and obtain favor; thus 
have I, myself, become an old man on earth and have lived 110 years in favor with 
the king, and approved by my seniors." 

On Freedom from Arrogance. "If thou art become great, after thou hast been 
humble, and if thou hast amassed riches after poverty, being because of that the first 
in thy town; if thou art known for thy wealth and art become a great lord, let not 
thy lieart become proud because of thy riches, for it is God who is the author of them. 
Despise not another who is as thou wast ; be towards him as towards thy equal." 

On Cheerfulness. " Let thy face be cheerful as long as thou livest; has any one 
come out of the coffin after having once entered it?" 

Miscellaneous Books. —Several treatises on medicine have been 
deciphered. They generally abound in charms and adjurations. 
Works on rhetoric and mathematics, and various legal and po- 
litical documents, are extant. Epistolary correspondence is abun- 
dant. A letter addressed by a priest to one of the would-be poets 
of the time contains this wholesome criticism : — 

" It is very unimportant what flows over thy tongue, for thy compositions are 
very confused. Thou tearest the words to tatters, just as it comes into thy mind. 
Thou dost not take pains to find out their force for thyself. If thou rushest wildly 
forward thou wilt not succeed. I have struck out for thee tlie end of thy composi- 
tion, and I return to thee thy descriptions. It is a confused medley when one liears 
it ; an uneducated person could not understand it. It is like a man from the low- 
lands speaking with a man from Elephantine." 

A few works of fiction exist which belong to the XII*^^ dynasty, 
and there are many beautiful hymns addressed to the different g^ds. 
A long and popular poem, the Epic of Pentaur, which celebrated 

the tomb with his mummy while his soul performed its appointed pilgrimage. The 
soul which was rejected by Osiris and his forty-two assessors, took the form of a pig 
or other unclean animal, and, if incorrigible, was finally annihilated. 



26 



EGYPT. 



the deeds of Rameses II., won the prize in its time as an heroic song, 

and was engraved on temple walls at Abydus, Luxor, Karnak, and 

the Ramesseum. It is sometimes styled " The Egyptian Iliad." 

Education was under the control of the priesthood. Great 

attention was paid to mathematics 
and to writing, of which the Egyp- 
tians were especially fond. Geom- 
etry and mensuration were important, 
as the yearly inundation of the Nile 
produced constant disputes concern- 
ing property boundaries. In music, 
only those songs appointed by law 
were taught, the children being care- 
fully guarded from any of doubtful 
sentiment. As women were treated 
with great dignity and respect in 
Egypt, reigning as queens and serv- 
ing in the holiest offices of the temple, 
they probably shared in the advan- 
tages of schooling. The common people had little education, 
except what pertained to their calling. Reading and writing were 
so difficult as to be considered great accomplishments. 

Monuments and Art. — Stupendous size and mysterious sym 
holism characterize aU the monuments of this strange people 
They built immense pyramids holding closely hidden chambers : 
gigantic temples ^ whose massive entrances, guarded by great stone 
statues, were approached by long avenues of colossal sphinxes ; vast 
temple-courts, areas, and halls in which were forests of carved and 
painted columns ; and lofty obelisks, towers, and sitting statues,^ 




QUEEN AIDING KING IN TEMPLE 
SERVICE (THEBES). 



1 The temples were isolated by huge brick inclosures, and wore an air of solemn 
mystery. None but priests could enter the holy precincts. The Great Temple of 
Karnak (see ill. p. 9) was 1200 feet long by 360 wide; its Great Hall, 340 by 170 feet, 
contained 134 painted columns, some of them 70 feet high and 12 feet in diameter. 
This temple was joined to one at Luxor by an avenue of sphinxes two miles long. 
Other famous monuments are the Memnoniutn, built by Amunoph III. ; the Barnes- 
seM«t, by Rameses II.; and the ilfe^inei-^ftow palace of Rameses III. The construction 
and various reparations of some of these vast piles of stone cover immense periods of 
times Excavations made in 1887 at Tell-Basta, the ancient Bubastis, show that a 
temple to Pasht, tlie cat-lieaded goddess (p. 30), existed there from the time of the 
Pyramid dynasty down to 150 B. c. 

2 Rameses II. reared gigantic self-statues all over Egypt. A wall-painting discov- 
ered at Luxor in 1891 shows six colossi in front of the temple at its dedication. His 
sitting statue at the Meranonium was 22 feet across the shouldeis, and weighed nearly 
900 tons ; his standing statue at Tanis towered 92 feet above the plain. 



THE CIVILIZATION. 



27 



which still endure, though desert winds and drifting sands have 
beaten upon them for thousands of years. 

Sculpture, Painting, Statuary. — Egyptian granite is so hard 
that it is cut with difficulty by the best steei tools of to-day ', yet 
the ancient sculptures are sometimes graven to the depth of 
several inches, and show an exquisite finish and accuracy of detail. 
Painting was usually combined with sculpture, the natural hue of 
the objects represented being crudely imitated. Blue, red, green, 
black, yellow, and white were the principal colors. Red, which 
typified the sun, and blue, the color of the sky reflected in the 
Nile, were sacred tints. Tombs, which were cut in the solid rock, 
had no outer ornamentation, but the interior was gayly painted 
with scenes from every-day life. Sarcophagi and 
the walls which inclosed temples were covered 
both inside and outside with scenes or inscrip- 
tions. The painted scenes were sometimes taken 
from the " Book of the Dead " j often they were 
vivid delineations of the royal conquests. The 
proportion, form, color, and e?:pression of every 
statue were fixed by laws prescribed by the 
priests, the effect most sought being that of im- 
movable repose. 1 A wooden statue found at 
Sakkarah, and belonging to one of the earliest 
dynasties, is remarkable for its fine expression 
and evident effort at portraiture.^ 

Mode of Drawing, Perspective. — In drawing the 
human form, the entire body was traced, after which the drapery 
was added (see cut). Several artists were employed on one picture. 
The first drew squares of a definite size, upon which he sketched in 
red an outline of the desired figure ; the next corrected and improved 
it in black ; the sculptor then followed with his chisel and other 
tools j and finally the most important artist of all laid on the pre- 
scribed colors. The king was drawn on a much larger scale than his 
subjects, his dignity being suggested by his colossal size. Gods and 

1 All Egyptian statues have a stiflf, rigid pose, and are generally fastened at the 
hack to a pillar. In standing statues the arms are held close to the sides . in seated, 
the knees are pressed together, and the hands spread out upon them, palms down. 

2 When Mariette discovered in tlie Memphite necropolis this now famous statue of 
a man standing and holding in his hand the baton of authority, the fellahs (peasants) 
saw in it a wonderful resemblance to their own rustic tax-assessor, the dignitary of 
the place. An astonished fellah shouted out, " It's the Sheikh-el-Beled ! " His com- 
panions took up the cry, and the statue has been called by that name ever since. This 
incident Illustrates the persistency of national type. 




SON OF KAMESES III. 

(Thebes.) 



28 



EGYPT. 



goddesses were frequently represented with the head of an animal 
on a human form. There was no idea of perspective, and the general 
effect of an Egyptian painted scene was that of grotesque stiffness. 
Practical Arts and Inventions. — We have seen how the 
Egyptians excelled in cutting granite. Steel was perhaps in use 
as early as the IV^^^ dynasty, as pictures on the Memphite tombs 
seem to represent butchers sharpening their knives on a bar of 
that metal. Great skill was shown in alloying, casting, and sol- 
dering metals. Some of their bronze implements^ though buried 
for ages, and since exposed to the damp of European climates, 
are still smooth and bright. They possessed the art of imparting 
elasticity to bronze or brass, and of overlaying bronze with a 
rich green by means of acids. 

Glass bottles are represented in the earliest sculptures, and 
the Egyptians had their own secrets in coloring, which the best 
Venetian glass-makers of to-day are unable to discover. Their glass 
mosaics were so delicately ornamented that some of the feathers of 
birds and other details can be made out only with a lens, which 
would imply that this means of magnifying was used in Egypt. 
Gems and precious stones were successfully imitated in glass; 
and Wilkinson says, *' The mock pearls found by me in Thebes 

were so well counterfeited that even now 
it is difficult with a strong lens to detect 
the imposition." 

Goldsmiths washing and working gold 
are seen on monuments of the IV*'^ dy- 
nasty ; and gold and silver wire were 
woven into cloth and used in embroidery 
as early as the XII^'^ dynasty. Gold rings, 
bracelets, armlets, necklaces, ear-ringSi 
vases, and statues were common in the 
same age, the cups being often beauti- 
fully engraved and studded with precious 
stones. Objects of art were sometimes 
made of silver or bronze inlaid with gold, 
or of baser metals gilded so as to give 
the effect of solid gold. 

Veneering was extensively practiced, 
and in sculptures over 3300 years old workmen are seen with glue- 
pot on the fire, fastening the rare woods to the common sycamore 
and acacia. In cabinet-work Egypt excelled, and house-furni- 
ture assumed graceful and elegant forms. 




EGYPTIAN EASY-CHAIR. 



THE CIVILIZATION. 



29 



Flax and Cotton were grown, and great perfection was reached 
in spinning and weaving. Linen cloth of exquisite texture has 
been found in Memphite tombs, and the strong flax-strings used 




EGYPTIAN COUCH, PILLOW, AND STEPS. 

for fowling-nets were so finely spun that it was said "a man 
could carry nets enough to surround a whole wood." Finally, 
wooden hoes, shovels, forks, and plows, toothed sickles, and drags 

aided the farmer 
in his work^ the 
carpenter had his 
ax, hammer, file, 
adz, hand - saw, 
chisel, drill, plane, 
right angle, ruler, 
and plummet j the 
glass-worker and 
gem-cutter used 
EGYPTIAN MUSICIANS cmcry powder, if 

(THE GUITAR, HARP, AND BOUBLE PIPE). jj^q^ ^ lapidary'S 

wheel } the potter had his wheel upon which he worked the clay 
after he had kneaded it with his feet j the public weigher had 
stamped weights and measures, and delicate scales for balancing 
the gold and silver rings used as currency 5 musicians played on 
pipes, harps, flutes,i guitars, lyres, tambourines, and cymbals j 
while drum and trumpet cheered the soldier in his march. 




1 In 1889 several flutes were found in an Egyptian tomb. These instruments, which 
are over three thousand years old, give the exact sounds of our diatonic scale. 



30 EGYPT. 



3. THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 

General Character. — The Egyptians were mild in disposition, 
polite in manners, reverential to their elders and superiors, extremely 
loyal and patriotic, and intensely religious. They have been called 
a gloomy people, but their sculptures reveal a keen sense of humor 
and love of caricature. They were especially fond of ceremonies and of 
festivals. Their religion formed a part of their every-day life, and 
was interwoven with all their customs. 

Bieligion. — The Egyptian priests believed in one invisible, over- 
ruling, self-created God; the immortality of the soul; a judgment 
after death ; the final annihilation of the wicked ; and the ultimate 
absorption of the good into the eternal Deity. 

"God created his own members, which are tJie gods," they said; 
and so out of one great God grew a host of lesser ones, regarded by 
the priests as only His attributes and manifestations, but becoming to 
the people distinct and separate divinities. Natural objects and prin- 
ciples were thus deified, — the soil, the sky, the east, the west, even 
the general idea of time and space. Each month and day had its own 
god. The Nile, as the source of the country's fertility, was especially 
revered ; and the conflict of God with sin was seen in the life-giving 
river, and the barren, encroaching desert. 

TJie Sun, especially in later times, was the great exponent of 
Deity. His mysterious disappearance each night, and his return every 
morning to roll over the heavens with all the splendor of the pre- 
ceding day, were events full of symbolic meaning. The rising sun 
was the beautiful young god Horus. In his mid-day glory he was Ra, 
as he neared the western horizon he became Tum, and during the 
night he was Amun. Each of these gods, as well as the many others 
connected with the sun, had his own specific character. This complex 
sun-god was imagined to float through the sky in a boat, accompanied 
by the souls of the Supremely Blest, and at night to pass into the 
regions of the dead. 

Tt'iad of Orders. — There were three orders of gods. The first l 

1 In Thebes, -4mMn- 22a (the "Concealed God" or "Absolute Spirit ") headed the 
deities of the first order. He was represented as having tlie liead of a ram, the 
hieroglyphic of a ram signifying also concealment. In Memphis, Phtah ("Father 
of the Beginnings "), the Creator, was chief . his symbol was the Scaraboeus, or beetle, 
an image of which was placed on the heart of every mummy. Phtah was father of 
Ba, the sun-god. Ra was, in the mystic sense, that which is to day, the existing 
present. The hawk was his emblem. Pasht, his sister, one of tlie personifications 
of the sun's strong rays, sometimes healthful, sometimes baneful, was both loved and 
feared. She was especially worshiped at Bubastis; but her statues, having the head 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 



31 



was for the priesthood, and represented the ideal and spiritual part of 
the religion ; the second impersonated human faculties and powers ; 
and the third — the most popular of all among the people — was made 
up of forms and forces in nature. 

Triads of Gods. — Each town or city had its specially honored triad 
of deities to whom its temples were dedicated. The triads often con- 
sisted of father, mother, and son, but sometimes of two gods and a 
king. Osiris, who with Isis and 
Horus formed the most celebrated 
of these triads, was worshiped 
throughout the land. So popular 
were these deities that it has been 
said, " With the exception of Amun 
and Neph, they comprise all Egyp- 
tian mythology." 1 

Animal Worship. — As early as 
the II'i dynasty certain animals 
had come to be regarded as em- 
blems or even incarnations of the 
gods. The bull Apis, whose tem- 
ple was at Memphis, was sup- 
posed to be inhabited by Osiris 

himself, and the sacred presence of the god to be attested by cer- 
tain marks on the body of the animal. Apis was consulted as an 




BRONZE FIGURE OF APIS. 



of a cat, are common all over Egypt. Neph, often confounded with Amun, and, like 
him, wearing the ram's head, was the Divine Breath or Spirit pervading matter; 
sheep were sacred to him. Thoth, son of Neph, was god of intelligence; the ibis 
was his emblem. Sate, the wife of Neph and one of the forms of Isis, was the god- 
dess of vigilance ; she was the eastern sky waiting for the morning sun. Athor, 
goddess of love, was the beautiful western sky, wife of the evening sun, taking the 
wearied traveler to rest in her arms after each day's labor ; the cow was her emblem. 
Neifh, wife of Phtah, was goddess of wisdom ; she was the night sky which induces 
reflection. Maut, the Mother Goddess and greatest of the sky divinities,— which 
were all feminine,— was the cool night sky tenderly brooding over the hot, exhausted 
earth ; the shrew-mouse was sacred to her. Typhon was the common enemy of all 
the other gods ; his emblems were the pig, the ass, and the hippopotamus. 

1 It was related that Osiris once went about the earth doing good ; that he was 
slain by Set (Typhon), his brother ; that his wife, Isis, by prayers and invocations, 
assisted in his resurrection; and that finally Horus, his son, avenged his wrongs 
and destroyed Set. In this myth Osiris represents Divine Goodness; Isis is the 
Love of Goodness ; Set, the principle of Evil ; and Horus, Divine Triumph. Osiris 
had a multitude of characters. He was the Nile ; he was the sun ; he was the judge 
of the dead; from him all souls emanated, and in him all justified souls were swal- 
lowed up at last. To know " the mysteries of Osiris " was the glory of the priesthood. 
Isis, too, appeared in many forms, and was called by the Greeks " she of the ten- 
thousand names." Mystic legends made her the mother, wife, sister, and daughter 
of Osiris ; while Horus was their son and brother, and was Osiris himself. 



32 EGYPT. 

oracle, and his breath was said to confer upon children the gift of 
prophecy. When an Apis died, great was the mourning until the 
priests found his successor, after which the rejoicing was equally- 
demonstrative. The cost of burying the Apis was so great as some- 
times to ruin the officials who had him in charge, i The calf Mnevis 
at Heliopolis, and the white cow of Athor at Athribis, were also rev- 
erenced as incarnations of Deity. Other animals were considered as 
only emblems. Of these, the hawk, ape, ibis, cat, 2 and asp were every- 
where worshiped; but crocodiles, dogs, jackals, frogs, beetles, and 
shrew-mice, as well as certain plants and vegetables, were venerated 
in different sections of the country. Those sacred in one nome were 
often in others hated and hunted or used for food. Thus, at Thebes 
the crocodile and the sheep were worshiped, while the goat was 
eaten ; at Mendes the sheep was eaten and the goat worshiped ; and 
at Apollinopolis the crocodile was so abhorred as an emblem of the 
evil spirit, that the people set apart an especial day to hunt and kill 
as many crocodiles as possible, throwing the dead bodies before the 
temple of their own god. 

The crocodile was principally worshiped about Lake Moeris in the 
Fayoom. A chosen number of these animals was kept in the tem- 
ples, where they were give» elegant apartments, and treated to every 
luxury, at public expense. Let us imagine a crocodile fresh from 
a warm, sumptuoiis bath, anointed with the most precious oint- 
ments, and perfumed with fragrant odors, its head and neck glittering 
with jeweled ear-rings and necklace, and its feet with bracelets, wal- 
lowing on a rich and costly carpet to receive the worship of intelligent 
human beings. Its death was mourned as a public calamity ; its body, 
wrapped in linen, was carried to the embalmers, attended by a train of 
people, weeping, and beating their breasts in grief ; then, having been 
expensively embalmed and bandaged in gayly colored mummy-cloths, 
amid imposing ceremonies it was laid away in its rock sepulcher. 

Embalming. — This art was a secret known only to those priests 

1 Ancient authorities state that no Apis was allowed to live over twenty-five 
years. If he attained that age, he was drowned witli great ceremony in the Nile. 
The following inscription upon a recently discovered memorial stone erected to an 
Apis of the XXIId dynasty, shows that at least one Apis exceeded tliat age : " This is 
the day on which the god was carried to his rest in the beautiful region of the west, 
and was laid in the grave, in his everlasting house and in his eternal ahode." . . 

" His glory was sought for in all places. After many months he was found in the 
temple of Phtah, beside his father, the Memphian god Phtah." ..." The full 
age of this god was 26 years." 

2 When a cat died in any private dwelling, the inmates shaved their eyebrows ; 
when a dog died, they shaved their entire bodies. The killing of a cat, even acci- 
dentally, was reckoned a capital offense. All sacred animals were embalmed, and 
buried with impressive ceremonies. 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 



33 




A MUMMY IN BANDS. 



who had it in charge^ The mummy was more or less elaborately pre- 
pared, according to the wealth and station of the deceased. In the 
most expensive process 
the brain and intestines 
were extracted, cleansed 
with palm- wine and aro 
matic spices, and either 
returned to the body or 
deposited in vases which 

were placed in the tomb with the coffin. 1 The body was also cleansed, 
and filled with a mixture of resin and aromatics, after which it was 
kept in niter for seventy days. It was then wrapped in bands of fine 
linen smeared on the inner side with gum. There were sometimes a 
thousand yards of bandages on one mummy. A thick papyrus case, 
fitted while damp to the exact shape of the bandaged body, next 
inclosed it. This case was richly painted and ornamented, the hair 
and features of the deceased being imitated, and eyes inlaid with 
brilliant enamel inserted. Sometimes the face was covered with 
heavy gold leaf. Often a network of colored beads was spread over 
the body, and a winged scarabseus (p. 30) placed upon the breast. A 
long line of hieroglyphics extending down the front told the name and 
quality of the departed. The inner case was inclosed in three other 




AN EGYPTIAN SAKCOPHAGUS. 



cases of the same form, all richly painted in different patterns. A 
wooden or carved stone sarcophagus was the final receptacle in the 
tomb. 2 



1 "So careful were the Egyptians to show proper respect to all that belonged to 
the human body, that even the sawdust of tlie floor where they cleansed it was tied 
up in small linen bags, which, to the number of twenty or thirty, were deposited in 
vases, and buried near the tomb."— Wilkinson. 

2 Tn a less expensive mode of embalming, the internal parts were dissolved by 
Oil of cedar, after which the body was salted with niter, as before. The ordinary 



34 



EGYPT. 



Burial. — ^When any person died, all the women of the house left 
the body and ran out into the streets, wailing, and throwing dust upon 
their heads. Their friends and relatives joined them as they went, 
and if the deceased was a person of quality, others accompanied them 
out of respect. Having thus advertised the death, they returned home 
and sent the body to the embalmers. During the entire period of its 
absence they kept up an ostentatious show of grief, sitting unwashed 

and unshaven, in soiled and torn garments, 
singing dirges and making lamentation. 
After the body was restored to them, if 
they wished to delay its burial, they placed 
it in a movable wooden closet standing 
against the wall of the principal room in 
the house. Here, morning and evening, 
the members of the family came to weep 
over and embrace it, making offerings to 
the gods in its behalf. Occasionally it was 
brought out to join in festivities given in 
its honor (p. 42). The time having come 
to entomb it, an imposing procession was 
formed, in the midst of which the mummy 
was drawn upright on a sledge to the sacred 
lake adjoining every large city. At this 
point forty-two chosen officials — einblem- 
atical of the forty-two judges in the court 
of Osiris (p. 24) — formed a semicircle around the mummy, and for- 
mal inquiries were made as to its past life and character. If no ac- 
cusation was heard, an eulogium was pronounced, and the body was 
passed over the lake. If, however, an evil life was proven, the lake 
could not be crossed, and the distressed friends were compelled to leave 
the body of their disgraced relative unburied, or to carry it home, and 
wait till their gifts and devotions, united to the prayers of the priest- 
hood, should pacify the gods. Every Egjrptian, the king included, was 
subjected to the "trial of the dead," and to be refused interment was ' 
the greatest possible dishonor. The best security a creditor could have 
was a mortgage on the mummies of his debtor's ancestors. If the debt 
were not paid, the delinquent forfeited his own burial and that of his 
entire family. 




A WOMAN EMBRACING 
HUSBAND'S MUMMY 
rThebes.) 



HER 



mummy-cloth was coarse, resembling our sacking. The bodies of the poor were 
simply cleansed and salted, or submerged in liquid pitch. These black, dry, heavy, 
bad smelling relics are now used by the fellahs for fuel. It is a fact that few mum- 
mies of children have been discovered. The priests had the monopoly of everything 
connected with embalming and burial, and they not only resold tombs which had 
been occupied, but even traflScked in second-hand mummy-cases. 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 



35 



The mummies of the poorer classes were deposited in pits in the 
plain or in recesses cut in the rock, and then closed up with masonry ; 
those of the lowest orders were wrapped in coarse cloth mats, or a 
bundle of palm-sticks, and buried in the earth or huddled into the 




THE FUNEKAL OF A MUMMY (AFTEK BRIDGEMAN). 

general repository. Various articles were placed in the tombs, espe- 
cially images of the deceased person, and utensils connected with his 
profession or trade (p. 38). Among the higher classes these objects 
were often of great value, and included elegant vases, jewelry, and 
important papyri. 



SCENES IN REAL LIFE. 



Scene I. — Pyramid Building (IV^b dynasty). ^ — Let us imagine 
ourselves in Egypt about 2400 B. c. It is the middle of November. The 
Nile, which, after its yearly custom, began to rise in June, changing 
its color rapidly from a turbid red to a slimy green and then again to 
red, overflowed its banks in early August, and, spreading its waters 
on either side, made the country to look like an immense lake dotted 
with islands. For the last month it has been gradually creeping back 
to its winter banks, leaving everywhere behind it a fresh layer of rich 
brown slime. Already the farmers are out with their light wooden 

1 Over seventy Egyptian pyramids have been discovered and explored, all situated 
on the edge of the desert, west of the Nile. The three Great Pyramids of Gizeh built 
by Khufu and his successors are the most celebrated. The Great Pyramid built In 
steps at Sakkarah, and said to date from the I"* or II'' dynasty, is believed by many 
to be the oldest monument in Egypt. 



36 



EGYPT. 




A MODERN SHADOOF. 



plows and hoes, or are harrowing with bushes the moist mud on 
which the seed has been thrown broadcast, and which is to be tram- 
pled down by the herds 
driven in for the pur- 
pose. The first crop of 
clover is nearing its har- 
vest ; by proper care and 
a persistent use of the 
sJtadoof,'^ three more 
crops will be gathered 
from the same ground. 
The crocodile and the 
hippopotamus haunt the 
river shores ; in the 
desert the wolf, jackal, 
and hyena prowl; but 
the greatest scourge and 
torment of the valley are the endless swarms of flies and gnats which 
rise from the mud of the subsiding Nile. 

King Khufu of the IVth dynasty is now on the throne, and the 
Great Pyramid, his intended tomb, is in process of erection near Mem- 
phis, the city founded by Menes three hundred years ago. One hun- 
dred thousand dusky men are toiling under a burning sun, now 
quarrying in the limestone rock of the Arabian hills, now tugging at 
creaking ropes and rollers, straining every nerve and muscle under the 
rods of hard overseers, as along the solid causeway 2 and up the inclined 
plane they drag the gigantic stones they are to set in place. Occasion- 
ally a detachment is sent up the river in boats to Syene to bring fine 
red granite, which is to be polished for casings to the inner passages 
and chambers. Not a moment is lost from work save when they sit 
down in companies on the hot sand to eat their government rations of 
''radishes, onions, and garlics," the aggregate cost of which is to be 
duly inscribed upon the pyramid itself. So exhausting is this forced 
and unpaid labor that four times a year a fresh levy is needed to take 
the place of the worn-out toilers. When this pyramid is finished, — and 
it will continue to grow as long as the king shall live, 3 — it will stand 



1 The pole and bucket with which water was drawn from the Nile to irrigate the 
land. It is still in use in Egypt. 

2 It took ten years to build the causeway whereon the stone was brought. The 
construction of the pyramid required twenty years more. Herodotus thought the 
causeway as great a work as the pyramid itself, and described it as built of polished 
stone, and ornamented with carvings of animals. 

3 As soon as a Pharaoh mounted his throne, he gave orders to some nobleman to 
plan the work and cut the stone for the royal tomb. The kernel of the future edifice 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 37 

480 feet high, with a base covering 13 acres. Its sides, which exactly 
face the four cardinal points, will be cased with highly polished stone 
fitted into the angles of the steps ; the workmen beginning at the apex 
and working downward, leaving behind them a smooth, glassy sur- 
face which cannot be scaled. There will be two sepulchral chambers 
with passages leading thereto, and five smaller chambers, ^ built to 
relieve the pressure of so great a mass of stone. The king's chamber, 
which is situated in the center of the pyramid and is to hold the royal 
sarcophagus, will be ventilated by air-shafts, and defended by a suc- 
cession of granite portcullises. But Khufu will not rest here, for his 
oppression and alleged impiety have so angered the people that they 
will bury him elsewhere, leaving his magnificently planned tomb, with 
its empty sarcophagus, to be wondered and speculated over, thousands 
of years after his ambitious heart has ceased to beat. 

Meantime other great public works are in progress. 2 Across the 
arm of the Red Sea, on the peninsula of Sinai, — not sacred Sinai yet, 
for there are centuries to come before Moses, — are the king's copper 
and turquoise mines. Sculpture is far advanced ; and images of gold, 
bronze, ivory, and ebony are presented to the gods. The whole land 
swarms with a rapidly increasing population ; but food is abundant,-^ 
raiment little more than a name, and lodging free on the warm earth. 
Besides, the numbers are kept down by a royal policy which rears 
enormous monuments at the price of flesh and blood. The over- 
wrought gangs constantly sink under their burdens, and hasten on to 
crowd the common mummy-pits in the limestone hills. 



•was raised on the limestone soil of the desert in the form of a small pyramid built 
in steps, of wliicli the well constructed and finished interior formed the king's eternal 
dwelling, witli the stone sarcophagus lying on the rocky floor. A second covering 
was added, stone by stone, on the outside of this kernel, a third to this second, and 
to this a fourth, the mass growing greater the longer the king lived. Every pyramid 
had its own proper name. That of Khufu bore a title of honor, "The Lights."— 
Brugsch's Egypt. 

1 In one of these small chambers. Colonel Vyse, who was the first to enter them, 
found tlie royal name scrawled in red ocher on the stones, as if done by some idle 
overseer in the quarry. It is a proof of the architectural skill of the Egyptians, that 
in such a mass of stone they could construct chambers and passages which, with a 
weight of millions of tons pressing upon them, should preserve their shape without 
crack or flaw for thousands of years. 

2 Near Khufu's Pyramid is the Great Sphinx, a massive union of solid rock and 
clumsy masonry, 14G feet long. This recumbent, human-headed lion, an image of the 
sun-god Horus, is believed to be older than the pyramid itself. Under the sand close 
by lies a vast temple constructed of enormous blocks of black or rose-colored granite 
and oriental alabaster without sculpture or ornament. Here, in a well, were found 
fragments of splendid statues of Shafra, the successor of Khufu. 

3 "The whole expense of a child from infancy to manhood," says Diodorus, "is 
not more than twenty drachmas " (about four dollars). 



38 EGYPT. 

Scene II. — A Lord of the IV^^ Dynasty has large estates managed 
by a host of trained servants. He is not only provided with baker, 
butler, barber, and other household domestics, but with tailor, sail- 
maker, goldsmith, tile-glazer, potter, and glass- blower, l His musi- 
cians, with their harps, pipes, and flutes, his acrobats, pet dogs, and 
apes, amuse his leisure hours. He has his favorite games of chance or 
skill, which, if he is too indolent to play himself, his slaves play in his 
presence. He is passionately fond of hunting, and of fishing in the 
numerous canals which intersect the country and are fed from the 
Nile. He has small papyrus canoes, and also large, square-sailed, 
double-masted boats, in which he sometimes takes out his wife and 
children for a moonlight sail upon the river ; his harpers sitting cross- 
legged at the end of the boat, and playing the popular Egyptian airs. 
But he does not venture out into the Mediterranean with his boats. 
He has a horror of the sea, and to go into that impure region would 
be a religious defilement. On land he rides in a seat strapped between 
two asses. He has never heard of horses or chariots, nor will they 
appear in Egypt for a thousand years to come. He wears a white 
linen robe, a gold collar, bracelets and anklets, but no sandals. For 
his table he has wheaten or barley bread, beef, game, fruits and 
vegetables, beer, wine, and milk. His scribes keep careful record of 
his flocks and herds, his tame antelopes, storks, and geese, writing 
with a reed pen on a papyrus scroll. He has his tomb cut in the rocks 
near the royal pyramid, where he sometimes goes to oversee the 
sculptors and painters who are ornamenting the walls of its entrance- 
chambers with pictures 2 of his dignities, riches, pleasures, and manner 
of life. Directly below these painted rooms, perhaps at a depth of sev- 
enty feet, is the carefully hidden mummy-pit. Here, in recesses cut 



1 Such a household must have been a center of practical education ; and an enter, 
prising Egyptian boy, dearly as he loved his games of ball and wrestling, was likely 
to be well versed in the processes of every trade. (See Brief Hist. France, p. 33.) 

2 These pictures, with various articles stored in the tomb, served a magical 
purpose, for the benefit of the Ka (p. 24). In the paintings on the walls, the Ka saw 
himself going to the chase, and he went to the chase; eating and drinking with liis 
wife, and he ate and drank with her. The terra-cotta statuettes, armed with hoe, flail, 
and seed-sack, worked the fields, drew the water, and reaped the grain, in his phantom 
life of industry , while the painted workmen on tlie papyri made his shoes, cooked his 
food, and carried liim to hunt in the desert or to fish in the marshes. Besides the 
periodical ofi'erings of fresh baked meats, wine, and fruits brought by ministering 
friends, the Ka was sometimes furnished with mummied meats packed in sealed 
hampers; and, to make sure of an abundance, a magical formula, placed on the 
funerary tablet in the entrance-chamber of the tomb, insured to him ghostly supplies 
of "thousands of loaves, thousands of beeves, thousands of geese," etc., down to the 
end of the weary cycle of waiting. If, finally, when that glad liour came, the mummy 
had perished, its place could be supplied by a portrait statue, which was snugly con- 
cealed behind the solid masonry. 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 39 

in the sides and bottom, will finally be placed the mummies of this 
lord and his family. Meantime he strives to be true to his gods, 
obedient to his king, and affectionate to his household ; for thus he 
hopes to pass the rigid ordeals which follow death, and to rest at last 
in the Boat of the Sun. 

Scene III. — Amenemhe JIT., the Labyrinth, and Lake Mceris'^ (XII^'i 
dynasty, about B. c. 2080-1900). — Over four centuries have passed since 
Khufu's Pyramid was finished, and now toward the southwest, on an 
oasis in the midst of the desert, we see rising a magnificent group of 
palaces, built about an immense twelve-courted rectangle. The stone 
roofs and walls are covered with carvings Here are three thousand 
chambers, large and small, half of which are under ground and are 
to sepulcher mighty kings and sacred crocodiles This marvelous 
Labyrinth, where one "passes from courts into chambers, and from 
chambers into colonnades, from colonnades into fresh houses, and from 
these into courts unseen before," is surrounded by a single wall, and 
incloses three sides of the large central rectangle. On the fourth side 
stands a pyramid, engraven with large hieroglyphics, and entered by 
a subterranean passage. Amenemhe III. does not leave his identity 
as the founder of this grand palace tomb to the chance scrawls of a 
quarry workman, as did Khuf u with his pyi'amid, but has his cartouch 
properly inscribed on the building-stones. 

Lake Moeris. — There have been some grievous famines 2 in Egypt 
produced by the variable inundations of the Nile, and Amenemhe 



1 These descriptions of the Labyrinth and Lake Moeris are founded on Herodotus 
Strabo located the Labyrinth " between two pyramids." Prof. Petrie. who spent 
nearly three years (1888-90) exploring the Fayoom, states that he " found between two 
pyramidal structures an immense bed of fine white limestone concrete, upon which 
lie thousands of tons of limestone and red granite, fragments of the destroyed walls of 
some enormous structure." Profs. Sayce and Maspero believe that in " Lake Moeris " 
Herodotus saw only an overflow into a natural depression. All Egyptologists concede, 
however, that Amenemhat Ilf., in some way, greatly increased the amount of arable 
land m this region. Petrie found here several inscribed fragments of Amenemhat's 
statues and pyramidal pedestals. 

3 "All Egypt is the gift of the Nile," wrote Herodotus. The river, however, was 
not left to overflow its banks without restrictions. The whole country was inter 
sected with canals and protected by dikes, Menes himself, according to Herodotus, 
having constructed a dike and turned aside the course of the Nile in order to found 
Memphis. The rise of the river was closely watched, and was measured by " Nilom- 
eters " In various parts of the country , and the proper moment for cutting away 
the dams and opening the canals was awaited with intense anxiety, and decided by 
auspicious omens. "A rise of fourteen cubits caused joy, fifteen security, sixteen de- 
light." Twelve cubits foretold a famine. An excessive Nile was as disastrous as a 
deficient one. A " Good Nile " brought harvests so abundant as to make Egyptian 
storehouses the granary of the eastern world. For this reason, when the famine 
arose in Canaan, Abrara and Sarai came to Egypt, probably during the reign of the 
.XI"' dynastv. 



40 



EGYPT. 



causes to be constructed not far from the Labyrinthine Palace a gigan- 
tic lake, with one canal leading to the great river, and another ter- 
minating in a natural lake still farther to the west. 
He thus diverts the waters of an excessive Nile, and 
hoards those of a deficient one to be used at need on 
the neighboring lands. He stocks this lake with fish, 
and so provides for the future queens of Egypt an 
annual revenue of over $200,000 for pin-money. The 
banks of Lake Moeris are adorned with orchards, vine- 
yards, and gardens, won by its waters from the sur- 
rounding desert. Toward the center of the lake, rising 
three hundred feet above its surface, stand two pyra- 
mids, and on the apex of each sits a majestic stone 
figure. But pyramid-building is going out of favor in 
Egypt, and the fashion of obelisks has come in. These 
are made of single blocks of beautiful red granite from 
Syene, and are covered with delicately carved hiero- 
glyphs. Memphis is losing her precedence. Thebes 
is shining in her first glory, and the Temple of Kar- 
nak, which is to become the most splendid of all times 
and countries, is begun; while, down the river, at 
Beni Hassan, 1 the powerful princes have built tombs 
which, like cheerful homes, spread their pillared 
porches in the eastern rocky heights. 

Scene IV. — A Thehan Diymer-Party (time of Ea- 
meses 11., 1311-1245 b. c). — The Labyrinth has stood for nearly 
seven centuries. During this time the shepherd kings have had their 
sway and been expelled. The XVIII*^ dynasty, including the long and 




■^'Vo ■ 



OBELISK. 



1 The tombs of Beni Hassan in Middle Egypt are remarkable for their archi- 
tecture, the prototype of the Grecian Doric (p. 182). They are also noticeable for 
being east of the Nile, and for not being concealed, as was the almost universal 
custom. A recent visitor to these tombs writes : " Having ascended the broad road 
which leads gradually up to the entrances, we found ourselves on a sort of platform 
cut in tlie cliff nearly half-way to the top, and saw before us about thirty high and 
wide doorways, each leading into one chamber or more, excavated in the solid rocli. 
The first we entered was a large square room, with an open pit at one end,— the 
mummy-pit; and every inch of the walls was covered with pictures. Coming into 
this tomb was like getting hold of a very old picture-book, which said in the begin- 
ning, 'Open me and I will tell you what people did a long time ago.' Every group 
of figures told a separate story, and one could pass on from group to group till a 
whole life was unfolded. Whenever we could find a spot where the painted plaster 
had not been blackened or roughened, we were surprised at the variety of the colors, 
— delicate lilacs and vivid crimsons and many sliades of green." Though these pic- 
tures on the walls of tombs were supposed to serve the dead, they were no less repre- 
sentations of real life. Were it not for them, we should never liave learned the secrets 
of those homes along the Nile where people lived, loved, and died over four thousand 
years ago. 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 41 

brilliant reign of Thothmes III., has passed away, leaving behind it 
temples, obelisks, and tombs of marvelous magnificence. Thebes is at 
the height of that architectural triumph which is to make her the won- 
der of succeeding ages. Meantime, what of the people ? Let us invite 
ourselves to a dinner-party in Theban high life. The time is mid-day, 
and the guests are arriving on foot, in palanquins borne by servants, 
and in chariots. A high wall, painted in panels, surrounds the fashion- 
able villa, and on an obelisk near by is inscribed the name of the owner. 
We enter the grounds by a folding-gate flanked with lofty towers. 
At the end of a broad avenue bordered by rows of trees and spacious 
water-tanks stands a stuccoed brick l mansion, over the door of which 
we read in hieroglyphics, " The Good House." The building is made 
airy by corridors, and columns, and open courts shaded by awnings, 
all gayly painted and ornamented with banners Its extensive grounds 
include flower-gardens, vineyards, date-orchards, and sycamore-groves. 
There are little summer-houses, and artificial ponds from which rises 
the sweet, sleepy perfume of the lotus-blossom ; here the genial host 
sometimes amuses his guests by an excursion in a pleasure-boat towed 
by his servants. The stables and chariot-houses are in the center of 
the mansion, but the cattle-sheds and granaries are detached. 

"We will accompany the guest whose chariot has just halted. The 
Egyptian grandee drives his own horse, but is attended by a train of 
servants ; one of these runs forward to knock at the door, another takes 
the reins, another presents a stool to assist his master to alight, and 
others follow with various articles which he may desire during the 
visit. As the guest steps into the court, a servant receives his sandals 
and brings a foot-pan that he may wash his feet. He is then invited 
into the festive chamber, where side by side on a double chair, to which 
their favorite monkey is tied, sit his placid host and hostess, blandly 
smelling their lotus-flowers and beaming a welcome to each arrival. 
They are dressed like their guests. On his shaven head the Egyptian 
gentleman wears a wig with little top-curls, and long cues which hang 
behind. His beard is short — a long one is only for the king. His 
large-sleeved, fluted robe is of fine white linen, and he is adorned with 
necklace, bracelets, and a multitude of finger-rings. The lady by his 
side wears also a linen robe over one of richly colored stuff. Her hair 
falls to her shoulders front and back, in scores of crisp and glossy 
braids. The brilliancy of her eyes is heightened by antimony ; and 
amulet beetles, 2 dragons, asps, and strange symbolic eyes dangle from 

1 The bricks were made of Nile mud mixed with chopped straw, and dried in 
the sun. 

2 The beetle was a favorite emblem for ornaments. No less than 180 kinds of 
scarabfei are preserved m the Turin Museum alone. It was also engraved on the 
precious stones used as currency between Egypt and neighboring countries. 



42 EGYPT. 

her golden ear-rings, necklace, bracelets, and anklets. Having saluted 
his entertainers, the new-comer is seated on a low stool, where a serv- 
ant anoints his bewigged head with sweet-scented ointment, hands 
him a lotus-blossom, hangs garlands of flowers on his neck and head, 
and presents him with wine. The servant, as he receives back the 
emptied vase and offers a napkin, politely remarks, ''May it benefit 
you." This completes the formal reception. 

Each lady is attended in the same manner by a female slave. While 
the guests are arriving, the musicians and dancers belonging to the 
household amuse the company, who sit on chairs in rows and chat, the 
ladies commenting on each other's jewelry, and, in compliment, ex- 
changing lotus-flowers. The house is furnished with couches, arm- 
chairs, ottomans, and footstools made of the native acacia or of ebony 
and other rare imported woods, inlaid with ivory, carved in animal 
forms, and cushioned or covered with leopard-skins. The ceilings are 
stuccoed and painted, and the panels of the walls adorned with colored 
designs. The tables are of various sizes and fanciful patterns. The 
floor is covered with a palm-leaf matting or wool carpet. In the bed- 
rooms are high couches reached by steps ; the pillows are made of wood 
or alabaster (see cut, p. 29). There are many elegant toilet con- 
veniences, such as polished bronze mirrors, fancy bottles for the kohl 
with which the ladies stain their brows and eyelids, alabaster vases 
for sweet-scented ointments, and trinket-boxes shaped like a goose, a 
fish, or a human dwarf. Everywhere throughout the house is a profu- 
sion of flowers, hanging in festoons, clustered on stands, and crowning 
the wine-bowl. Not only the guests but the attendants are wreathed, 
and fresh blossoms are constantly brought in from the garden to replace 
those which are fading. 

And now the ox, kid, geese, and ducks, which, according to custom, 
have been hurried into the cooking-caldrons as soon as killed, are 
ready to be served. After hand-washing and saying of grace, the 
guests are seated on stools, chairs, or the floor, one or two at each 
little low, round table. The dishes, many of which are vegetables, 
are brought on in courses, and the guests, having neither knife nor 
fork, help themselves with their fingers. Meantime a special corps 
of servants keep the wine and water cool by vigorously fanning the 
porous jars which contain them. During the repast, when the enjoy- 
ment is at its height, the Osiris — an image like a human mummy — is 
brought in and formally introduced to each visitor with the reminder 
that life is short, and all must die. This little episode does not in the 
least disturb the placidity of the happy guests. There is one, how- 
ever, to whom the injunction is not given, and who, though anointed 
and garlanded, and duly installed at a table, does not partake of the 
delicacies set before him. This is a real mummy, a dear, deceased 



SUMMARY. 43 

member of the family, whom the host is keeping some months before 
burial, being loath to part with him. It is in his honor, indeed, that 
the relatives and friends are assembled, and the presence of a beloved 
mummy, whose soul is journeying toward the Pools of Peace, is the 
culminating pleasure of an Egyptian dinner-party. 



4. SUMMARY. 

1. Political History. — Our earliest glimpse of Egypt is of a 
country already civilized. Menes, the first of the Pharaohs, changed 
the course of the Nile and founded Memphis. His successor was a 
physician, and wrote books on anatomy. Khufu, Shafra, and Menkara, 
of the IVtii dynasty, built the three Great Pyramids at Gizeh. In their 
time there were already an organized civil and military service and an 
established religion. From the Vltii to the Xl^h dynasty the monu- 
ments are few and history is silent. Thebes then became the center 
of power. The XIPii dynasty produced Lake Mceris and the Laby- 
rinth, and waged war against the Ethiopians. Meanwhile the Hyksos 
invaded Lower Egypt and soon conquered the land. At last a Theban 
monarch drove out the barbarian strangers. The XVIIItii and XIX^^i 
dynasties raised Egypt to the height of her glory. Thothmes, Amunoph, 
Seti, and, chief of all, Rameses II., covered the land with magnificent 
works of art, and carried the Egyptian arms in triumph to the depths 
of Asia. After the XXtii dynasty Egypt began to decline. Her weak 
kings fell in turn before the Ethiopians, the Assyrians, and, finally, 
the Persians. The illustrious line of the Pharaohs was at length swal- 
lowed up in the Empire of Persia (see note, p. 46). 

2. General Character of Egyptian Civilization. — ^In sum- 
ming up our general impressions of Egypt, we recall as characteristic 
features her Pyramids, Obelisks, Sphinxes, Gigantic Stone Statues, 
Hieroglyphics, Sacred Animals, and Mummies. We think of her wor- 
shiped kings, her all-powerful priests, and her Nile-watered land 
divided between king, priests, and soldiers. We remember that in her 
fondness for inscriptions she overspread the walls of her palaces and 
the pillars of her temples with hieroglyphics, and erected monuments 
for seemingly no other purpose than to cover them with writing. We 
see her tombs cut in the solid rock of the hillside and carefully con- 
cealed from view, bearing on their inner walls painted pictures of 
home life. Her nobility are surrounded by refinement and luxuries 
which we are startled to find existing 4000 years ago ; and her com- 
mon people crowd a land where food is abundant, clothing little 
needed, and the sky a sufficient shelter. 

We have found her architecture of the true Hamite type, colossal, 



44 EGYPT. 

massive, and enduring ; her art stiff, constrained, and lifeless ; her 
priest-taught schools giving special attention to writing and mathe- 
matics ; her literature chiefly religious, written on papyrus scrolls, 
and collected in libraries ; her arts and inventions numerous, including 
weaving, dyeing, mining and working precious metals, making glass 
and porcelain, enameling, engraving, tanning and embossing leather, 
working with potter's clay, and embalming the dead. Seeing her 
long valley inundated each year by the Nile, she made herself pro- 
ficient in mathematics and mensuration, erected dikes, established 
Nilometers, appointed public commissioners, and made a god of the 
river which, since it seldom rains in Egypt, gives the land its only 
fertility. Her religion, having many gods growing out of One, 
taught a judgment after death, with immortality and transmigration 
of soul ; its characteristic form was a ceremonial worship of animals as 
emblems or incarnations of Deity. Finally, as a people, the Egyp- 
tians were in disposition mild, unwarlike, superstitiously religious, in 
habits cleanly, luxurious, and delighting in flowers ; in mind subtle, 
profound, self -poised; in social life talkative, given to festivals, and 
loud in demonstrations of grief ; having a high conception of morals, 
a respect for woman, a love of literature, and a domestic affection 
which extended to a peculiar fondling of their mummied dead. 

READING REFERENCES. 

Brugsch'8 Egypt under the Pharaohs.— Bunsen's Egypt's Place in the World's 
History.— Birch's Egypt from the Earliest Times, and Egypt from the Monuinents.— 
Wilkinson's Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians.— Herodotus, Bawlin- 
son'8 Translation with Notes.- Rawlinson's Origin of Nations, and Manual of 
Ancient History.— Lenormant and Chevallier's Ancient History of the East.— Records 
of the Past (New Series).— Egypt over 3300 Years Ago {Illustrated Library of Won- 
ders).— Lilbke's History of Art. — Westropp's Handbook of Archaeology .— Fergusson's 
History of Architecture.— Early Egyptian History for the Young {Macmillan, Lon- 
don).— Zerffi's Historical Development of Art— George Ebers's Egypt {illustrated); and 
An Egyptian Princess, The Sisters, and Uarda {historical romances).— Mariette's 
Monuments of Upper Egypt— Perrot and Chipiez's History of Ancient Egyptian Art— 
Goodyear' s Grammar of the Lotus.— Books of the Egypt Exploration Fund and 
Archceological Survey.— Biblia {a current magazine). 

COMPARATIVE CHRONOLOGY, "LONG" AND "SHORT." 

B. C. B. C. 

Menes 5700 2700 

Old Empire 5700-3450 2700-2080 

Middle Empire 3450-1750 2080-1525 

Hyksos Rule 2325-1750 1900-1525 

New Empire 1750- 525 1525-527 

Persian Conquest ^ • - 525 527 




J.WELU6| OEki 





re 

jiy Ulue lines iTTovincea 



nuSSELL & STRUTHER8, &NQ'6 N.Y. 



BABYLONIA AND ASSYRIA. 



1. THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 

The Origin of the civilization along the Tigris and 
Euphrates may rival the Egyptian in antiquity j recent 
discoveries seem to remove far into the remote past that 
patriarchal civilization called Accadian, Sumerian, or Su- 
mero-Accadian. 

1. Chaldea. — Our earhest political glimpse of this 
country shows us a Turanian people with important cities ; 
each city governed by a priest-king, and containing a temple 
sacred to some particular deity. Semitic peoples then enter 
the land. These have less culture but greater intellectual 
capacity than the Accadians. During the many centuries 
which follow — how many no one knows — Sargon I., King of 
Accad, emerges from the mist of antiquity as a builder of 
palaces and temples, an editor of ancient Accadian literature, 
and a founder of libraries ; Ur-ea (Uruch, p. 64), King of 
Ur, scatters gigantic, rudely constructed temples all over 
Chaldea ; and Khamfnuragus, patron of science and litera- 

Oeographical Questions.— Locate Nineveh, Babylon, Tadmor, Accad, Erech, and 
Calneh. How far was it by direct line from Babylon to Memphis? To Thebes? 
Describe the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers. Locate and describe Mesopotamia, As.sy- 
ria, Chaldea or Babylonia, and Susiana. Ans Mesopotamia is a name given by the 
Greeks to the entire rolling plain between the Tigris and the Euphrates , Assyria 
was an arid plateau cut up by rocky ridges, stretching north of Babylonia to the 
Armenian Mountains; Babylonia was a rich alluvial plain formed by the deposit of 
the Tigris and Euphrates in the shallow waters of the Persian Gulf ; Susiana lay 
south-east of Assyria and east of Babylonia. Northern Chaldea was called Accad ; 
Southern Chaldea, Shumir. The alluvium was marvelously fertile. In it wheat grew 
so rank, that, to make it ear, the people mowed it twice, and then fed it off with cattle. 
The yield was enormous,— fifty-fold at the least, and often a hundred-fold- 



46 BABYLONIA AND ASSYRIA. [2280 B. C. 

ture, unites Accad and Shumir into one kingdom and makes 
Babylon the capital. All this occurs before 2000 b. c.^ The 
ever-nomadic Semites push northward, and, later, people the 
middle Tigris, where they build great cities and lay the 
foundations of the Assyrian Empire. 

As Chaldea had no natural boundary or defense, it was 
singularly open to attack. There were constant wars with 
the fast-rising power of Assyria, and in the 13th cent- 
ury B. c. the Chaldeans were conquered by their northern 
rival. The period of their servitude lasted nearly seven cent- 
uries, during which they became thoroughly Assyrianized 
in language and customs. Being, however, a sturdy, fiery, 
impetuous, warlike race, they often revolted. At one time 
— known in history as the Era of Nahonassar {74:7 B. c.) — 
they achieved a temporary independence, and on the fall of 
Nineveh (606 ? b. c.) they at once rose to power, founding 
the second Babylonian Empire. 

2. Assyria, for nearly seven centuries (1298-606 b. c), — 
from the conquest of Babylon to the overthrow of Nineveh, 
its own capital, — was the great empire ^ of south-western 
Asia. It attained its glory under Sargon and his descend- 
ants, — the Sargonidae. The Assyrian sway then reached to 
the Mediterranean Sea, and included Syria, Media, Baby- 
lonia, Mesopotamia, Phoenicia, Palestine, and parts of Arabia 
and Egypt. These conquered nations retained their laws, 

1 Early Chaldean chronology is as uncertain as P^gyptian. Berosus, a Babylonian, 
wrote (4th century b. c.) a history of his country, founded on the records in the 
temple of Belus. His work, like Manetho's, is known only by portions quoted in other 
books. Archaeological research is now as enthusiastically pressed in Chaldea as in 
Egypt. A recently discovered cylinder at Sippara, near Accad, points to the remote 
date of 3800 B. c. for Sargon I. 

2 This was the first of the successive " World-Empires." Following it was the 
Persian under Cyrus. This was conquered by Alexander, wlio founded the Mace- 
donian ; and it in turn gave place to the grandest of all,— the Roman. Out of its ruins 
grew up the Mohammedan of Asia and Africa, and Charlemagne's in Europe. The 
former was shattered by the Turks, and the latter was broken un into several of the 
kingdoms of modern Europe. 



625 B. c] 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 



47 



kings, and religion, but, being required to pay tribute and 
furnish a military contingent to the royal army, they were 
always ripe for revolt. The history of Assyria is therefore 
the record of an empire constantly falling to pieces, and as 
often restored through the genius of some warrior-king. 




ASSYRIAN HEADS (FROM NIMROUU). 



About 606 B. c. Nineveh was captured by the combined forces 
of the Babylonians and Medes. Tradition says that its 
effeminate king Sar'-a-cus, taking counsel of his despair, 
burned himself in his palace with all his treasures. The 
conquerors utterly destroyed the city, so that there remained 
only a heap of ruins. ^ 

The Names of the Assyrian Kings are tedious, and 
the dates of their reigns uncertain. Authorities differ greatly 
even in the spelling of the names. Some of the monarchs 
are notable from their connection with Grecian or Jewish 
history. Tig' -IqtM-nin (worship be to Nin, p. 62) is sup- 
posed to be the G-reek Ninus; on his signet-ring was in- 
scribed " The Conqueror of Babylon," which connects him 
with the overthrow of Chaldea, already mentioned. Tiglath- 
Pile'ser I. (1110 b. c.) may be called "The Religious Con- 
queror." He built temples, palaces, and castles, introduced 

1 Xenophon, during the famous retreat of the Ten Thousand, only two centuries 
after this catastrophe, passed the site of Nineveh, yet does not even mention the 
tact in his history, so perfectly had Nineveh disappeared. 



48 BABYLONIA AND ASSYRIA. [1130 B. C. 

foreign cattle and vegetable products^ and constrncted canals. 
He multiplied the war-chariots, and carried the Assyrian 
arms to the Persian mountains on the east and to northern 
Syria on the west ; ^ but he was repulsed by the Babylonians, 
who bore off his idols to their capital, where they were 
kept four hundred years. Asshur-kir-pal (Sardanapalus I., 
883-858), a cruel but magnificent king, made many con- 
quests, but is chiefly to be remembered in connection with 
the arts, which he raised to a point never before attained. 
He lined his palace walls (Nimroud) with great alabaster 
slabs, whereon were sculptured in spirited bas-reUef the 
various glories he had achieved. He was a hunter as well as 
a warrior and an art patron, and kept a royal menagerie, 
where he gathered all the mid beasts he could procure from 
his own and foreign lands. 

Shahnane'ser ^ II. was contemporary with Ahab and Jehu, ' 
kings of Israel ; he personally conducted twenty-four mili- 
tary campaigns. Vul-lush III. (810-781) married Sam- 
muramit, heiress of Babylon, and probably the original of 



1 A lengthy document written by Tiglath-Pileser, narrating some events of liif. 
reign, has been discovered. He writes : " The country of Kasiyara, a difficult region, 
I passed through. With their 20,000 men and their five kings I engaged. I defeated 
them. The ranks of their warriors in fighting the battle were beaten down as if by 
the tempest. Their carcasses covered the valleys and the tops of the mountains. I 
cut off their heads. Of the battlements of their cities I made heaps, like mounds of 
earth. Their movables, their wealth, and their valuables I plundered to a countless 
amount. Six thousand of their common soldiers I gave to my men as slaves." 
Having restored two ancient temples, he invokes the support of the gods, and adds ; 
" The list of my victories and the catalogue of my triumphs over foreigners hostile 
to Asshur I have inscribed on my tablets and cylinders. Whoever shall abrade or 
injure my tablets and cylinders, or shall moisten them with water, or scorch them 
with fire, or expose them to the air, or in the holy place of God shall assign them 
to a place where they cannot be seen or understood, or shall erase the writing and 
inscribe his own name, or shall divide the sculptures and break them off from my 
tablets, may Anu and Vul, the great gods, my lords, consign his name to perdition ! 
May they curse him with an irrevocable curse! May they pluck out the stability 
of the throne of his empire! May not his offspring survive him! May his servants 
be broken ! May his troops be defeated ! May his name and his race perish ! " 

2 In connection with Shalmaneser and the following kings, read carefully 2 Kings, 
xv-xix. 



810B.C.] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 49 

the mythical " Semiramis." According to the legend, this 
queen, having conquered Egypt and part of Ethiopia, invaded 
India with an army of a million men, but was beaten back 
by elephants ; she adorned Babylon with wonderful works, 
and at last took the form of a dove and flew away. Tiglath- 
Pileser III. (745-727) captured Damascus and conquered 
Ahaz, King of Judah. Shalmaneser IV. (727-722) laid siege 
to Samaria, which was taken by his successor, Sargon (722- 
705), who carried off its inhabitants and supplied their place 
with captive Babylonians. 

Sargon founded the house of the Sargonidse, who were the 
most brilliant of the Assyrian kings, and who made all the 
neighboring nations feel the weight of their conquering 
arms. He himself so subdued the Egyptians that they 
were never afterward the powerful nation they had been ; 
he also reduced Syria, Babylonia, and a great part of Media 
and Susiana. His son, the proud, haughty, and self-confi- 
dent SemiacJierih (sen-nak^-e-rib, 705-681), captured the 
" fenced cities of Judah," but afterward lost 185,000 men, 
'^ smitten by the angel of the Lord" in a single night. The 
sculptures represent him as standing in his chariot per- 
sonally directing the forced labor of his workmen, who were 
war-captives, often loaded with fetters. Usarhaddon, Sar- 
gon's grandson, divided Egypt into petty states, took Ma- 
nasseh. King of Judah, prisoner to Babylon (2 Chron. xxxiii. 
11), and more fully settled Samaria with colonists from 
Babylonia, Persia, and Susiana Asshur-hani-pal (Sardana- 
palus II., 668-626 ?),i Sargon's great-grandson, was a famous 
warrior, builder, and art patron. He erected a magnificent 
palace at Nineveh, in which he founded a royal Ubrary. His 

1 Aa the Greeks confounrled several Egyptian monarchs under the name of 
Sesostris the Great, so the Assyrian king whom they called Sardanapa'lus seems to 
have been a union of Asshurizirpal, Asshurhanipal, and Asshuremedihn. The Greek 
ideal Sardanapalus is celebrated m Byron's well-known play of that name. 



50 



BABYLONIA AND ASSYRIA. 



[626 B. O. 



son, Asshur-eined-ilin, or Saracns, as he was called by some 
Greek writers (p. 47), was the last Assyrian king. 

3. Later Babylonian Empire {606-bSS).—Nabopo- 
las'sar, a favorite general nnder Saracns, obtained from his 
master the government of Babylon. Here he organized 
a revolt, and made an alliance with Cyaxares, King of the 
Medes j in 606 b. c. their combined forces captnred Nineveh. 
The conquerors divided the spoils between them, and to 




BABYLONIAN HEADS (FROM THE SCULPTURES). 



Nabopolassarfell Phoenicia, Palestine, Syria, Snsiana, and the 
Euphrates valley. Babylon, after the ruin of its rival, 
became again the capital of the East. It held this position 
for nearly a century, when it was captured by Cyrus the 
Great (538 b. c). 

The Names of two of its kings are famihar to every 
Bible reader. Nehuchadnezzar (604-561), the son of Nabo- 
polassar, gave the new empu-e its character and position. 
Without him Babylon would have had little if any history 
worth recording. A great warrior, he captured Jerusalem,^ 
overran Egypt, and, after a thirteen-years' siege, subdued 
Tyre. A great builder, he restored or repaired almost every 
temple and city in the country. By his marvelous energy 
Babylon became five or six times the present size of London ; 

1 " Israel is a scattered sheep ; . . first the king of Assyria hatli devoured him ; 
and last this Nebuchadrezzar king of Bahylon hath broken his bones."— J^er. 1. 17. 



538 b. 0.] THE CIVILIZATION. 51 

and its walls and hanging gardens (p. 58) were among the 
Seven Wonders of the World (Appendix). Immense lakes 
were dug for retaining the water of the Euphrates, whence 
a net- work of canals distributed it over the plain to irrigate 
the land, while quays and breakwaters were constructed 
along the Persian GuK for the encouragement of commerce.i 
BeUhazzar held the throne jointly with his father, Nabona'- 
dius, the last king of Babylon. Cyrus, ruler of the rising 
empire of the Medes and Persians, invaded the country 
"with an army wide-spreading and far-reaching, hke the 
waters of a river." Having defeated the army in the open 
field, he besieged Babylon. One night when the Babylo- 
nians were celebrating a festival with drunken revelry, 
the Persians seized the unguarded gates and captured the 
place. From that time Babylon was a province of the 
Persian Empire, and its glory faded. Semitic power had suc- 
cumbed to Aryan enterprise. To-day the site of the once 
great city is marked only by shapeless mounds scattered 
over a desolate plain. 

2. THE CIVILIZATION. 

Society. — In Assyria there were no castes or hereditary aris- 
tocracy, but all subjects, foreign and native, had equal privileges, 
dependent upon the one absolute royal will. 

The King, though not worshiped as a god, as in Egypt, was 
considered " the earthly vicegerent of the gods," having undis- 
puted authority over the souls as well as the bodies of his people. 

The chief courtiers were eunuchs, who directed the public affairs, 
leaving the king undisturbed to enjoy his sports and pleasures. 
They, however, held their offices at his caprice, and were Hable 
at any moment to be removed. The people had the privilege of 

1 Read the Scriptural account of Babylon and its kinoes in Daniel, Isaiah (chaps. 
X., xi., xlii., xiv., xxi., xlv., xlvl., xlvii., and especially xix., xxiii.), Jeremiah (chapSr 
xlix., 1., and li.), 2 Kings (chaps, xxiv., xxv.), and Ezra (chaps, i.-vl.). 



bZ BABYLONIA AND ASSYRIA. 

direct petition to the Mug in case of public wrong or 

neglect.! 

In Babylonia^ where there was a mixed population, 

^rr\ society was divided into castes, of which the highest, 

^^ the ancient Chaldean, was not unlike that of the Egyp- 

\L^ tian priesthood. The Chaldeans read the warnings of 

1 ^1 ^ the stars, interpreted dreams and omens, gave instruc- 

^ I ^ tions in the art of magic and incantation, and conducted 

x/' I 1 the pompous religious ceremonies. They also decided 

= -o politics, commanded the armies, and held the chief state 

'^ g t offices. From them came all the royal rulers of Babylon. 

^i ^ "I The king was as despotic as in Assyria, and Baby- 

^ H o Ionian nobles at every slight offense trembled for their 

»jr- 1 S I heads. The whole Chaldean caste were once ordered to 

j^X ^ i ^6 exterminated because they could not expound the 

L I I dream of a king which he himself could not recall 

II (Dan. ii. 12). 

JY '^' I Merchants, artisans, and husbandmen formed each a 

I caste. The fishermen of the marshes near the Persian 

'^ Gulf corresponded to the swine-herds in Egypt, as 

* being lowest in the social scale. They lived on earth- 

i covered rafts, which they floated among the reeds, and 

I subsisted on a species of cake made of dried fish. 

^ i Writing. — Cuneiform Letters {cuneus, a wedge). — Clay 

^y g ^ Tahlets.—The earliest form of this writing, invented 

^~ E by the Turanians, was, hke the Egyptian, a collec- 

tion of rude pictures, with this peculiarity, that they 

TJJT were all straight-hned and angular, as if devised to be 

]^^ cut on stone with a chisel. The Chaldeans, having no 

stone in their country, made of the clay in which it 

abounded tiny pillow-shaped tablets, from one to five 

inches long. Upon these soft, moist tablets they traced 






^i 



1 A tablet in the British Museum thus exposes an official peculation in the time 
of Asshurbanipal : "Salutation to the king, my lord, from his humble petitioner,* 
Zikar Nebo. To the king, my lord, may Asshur, Shamash, Bel, Zarpanit, Nebo, 
Tashmit, Ishtar of Nineveh, Ishtar of Arbela, the great gods, protectors of royalty, 
give a hundred years of life to the king, my lord, and slaves and wives in great 
number to the king, my lord. The gold that in the month Tashrit the minister of 
state and the controller of the palace should have given me— three talents of pure 
gold and four talents of alloyed gold— to make an image of the king and of the 
mother of the king, has not yet been given. May my lord, the king, give orders 
to the minister of state and to the controller of the palace, to give the gold, to give 
it from this time, and do it exactly." 



THE CIVILIZATION. 



53 



the outline of the original object -picture in a series of distinct, 
wedge-like impressions made by the square or triangular point 
of a small bronze or iron tool. As in Egypt, the attempt to pre- 
serve the picture outline was gradually abandoned, and the charac- 
ters, variously modified by the differ- 
ent-speaking races inhabiting Assyria, 
came to have a variety of meanings.^ 
Cuneiform writing has been found 
even more difficult to interpret than 
Egyptian hieroglyphics. It has some 
of the peculiarities of that writing, 
but has no letter-signs, the cuneiform- 
writing nations never advancing so far 
as to analyze the syllable into vowels 
and consonants. Nearly three hun- 
dred different characters have been 
deciphered, and a large number re- 
main yet unknown.2 

Other Writing Materials, as Alabas- 
ter Slabs, Terra-cotta Cylinders, Cylin- 
der Signets, etc. — The Assyrian clay 
tablets were generally larger than the 
Chaldean, and for the royal records 
slabs of fine stone were preferred. 




ASSYRIAN CLAY TABLET. 



1 GeBerally all trace of tlie original picture disappeared, but in a few cases, such as 




the outline is still visible. A curious example of tlie picto- 



rial origin of the letters is 
furnished by the character 



iV^ 



which is the 



French une, the feminine of " one." This character may be traced back through 
several known forms to an original picture on a Koyunjik tablet ^ fc 



where it appears as a double-toothed comb. As this was a toilet article peculiar to 
women, it became the sign of the feminine gender. 

2 The BeMstun Inscription furnished the key to Assj^rian literature, as did the 
Rosetta stone to Egyptian. This inscription was carved by order of Darius Hys- 
tasp'es (p. 91) on the precipitous side of a high rock mountain in Media, 300 feet 
above its base. It is in three languages,— Persian, Median, and Assyrian. The Per- 
sian, which is the simplest of the cuneiform writings, having been mastered, it 
became, like the Greek on the Rosetta stone, a lexicon to the other two languages. 
Honorably connected with the opeuing-up of the Assyrian language in the present 
centuiy, are tlie names of Sir Henry Rawlinson. who at great personal risk scaled the 
Behistun Mountain and made a copy of the inscription, which he afterward pub- 
lished ; and M. Oppert, who systematized the newly discovered language, and founded 
an Assyrian grammar for the use of modern scholars. 



54 



BABYLONIA AND ASSYRIA, 




These slabs were used as panels in palace walls, where they set 
forth the glorious achievements of the Assyrian monarch s. Even 
where figures were sculptured upon the panels, the royal vanity 
was not deterred, and the self-glorifying narrations were earned 
uninterruptedly across mystic baskets, sacred trees, and the dresses 
of worshiping kings and eagle-headed deities. The colossal ala- 
baster bulls and lions which guarded the palace 
portals were also inscribed, and formal invocations 
to the gods were written on hollow terra-cotta 
cylinders, from eighteen to thirty-six inches high, 
which were placed in the temple corners. The 
hnes are sometimes more closely compacted 
than those in this paragraph, and the characters 
so fine that a magnifying glass is required to read 
them. Little cylinders made of jasper, chalcedony, 
or other stone were engraved and used as seals by 
rolling them across the clay tablets. There is no 
positive proof that anything like paper or parch- 
ment was ever in use among the Assryians,though the ruins furnish 
indirect testimony that it may have been employed in rare instances. 
Literature. — Libraries. — An Assyrian or Babylonian book con- 
sisted of several flat, square clay talDlets written on both sides, care- 
fully paged, and piled one upon another in order. Asshurbanipal, 
who as patron of arts and literature was to Assyria what Rameses II» 
had been to Egypt 600 years before, estabhshed an extensive public 
library 1 in his palace at Nineveh. Many of the books were copied 
from borrowed Babylonian tablets, but a large number were evi- 
dently composed under his royal patronage. He gathered works 
on geography, history, law, mathematics, astronomy, astrology, 
botany, and zoology. Complete lists of plants, trees, metals, and 
minerals were prepared; also a catalogue of every known species of 
animals, classified in families and genera. ^' We may well be aston- 
ished," says Lenormant, ^' to learn that the Assyrians had ah-eady 
invented a scientific nomenclature, similar in principle to that of 



A TERKACOn A 
CYLINDER. 



1 " Palace of Asshurbanipal, king of the worlcl, king of Assyria, to whom the 
god Nebo and the goddess Tashmit (the goddess of wisdom) have given ears to hear 
and eyes to see what is the foundation of government. They have revealed to the 
kings, my predecessors, this cuneiform writing, the manifestation of the god Nebo, 
the god of supreme intelligence. I have written it upon tablets, I liave signed it, I 
have placed it in my palace for the instruction of my subjects" {Inscription). One 
of the bricks of this library contains a notice that visitors are requested to give to the 
librarian the number of the book: they wish to consult, and it will be brought to them. 



THE CIVILIZATION. 65 

LinnsBus." Here, also, were religions books explaining the name, 
functions, and attributes of each god j magical incantations with 
which to charm away evil spirits ; and sacred poems, resembling in 
style the Psalms of David. Among the records copied from Baby- 
lonian tablets, which were already antiquities in the time of As- 
shurbanipal, were the Chaldean accounts of the Creation, the 
Deluge, and the Tower of Babel, which are strikingly like the nar- 
rative in Genesis, though written hundreds of years before Moses 
was born Most numerous of all were the various grammatical 
works. The Assyrians found their own language so complex, that 
lexicons and grammars were multiplied in efforts to explain and 
simplify it j and these books, written to aid the Assyrian learner 
over 2500 years ago, have been found invaluable in opening the 
long-lost language to the student of to-day. All this vast collec- 
tion of tablets, gathered with so much care by Asshurbanipal, 
fell with the palace in its destruction under his son, Saracus, 
and were mostly broken into fragments, i 

Monuments and Art. — As the Chaldeans had no stone, they 
made their edifices of burnt or sun-dried bricks, strengthening the 
walls by layers of reed matting cemented with bitumen. Their tem- 
ples were built in stories, each one smaller in area than the one 
below, thus forming an irregular pyramid. In later times the 
number of stories increased, and the outer walls of Babylonian 
temples were painted in colors consecrated to the heavenly bodies. 
That of Nebo at Borsippa ^ had its lowest stage black (Saturn) j 
the next orange (Jupiter) j then red (Mars), gold (the sun), yellow 
(Venus), blue (Mercury), and silver (the moon). The gold and 



1 " The clay tablets lay under the ruined palace in such multitudes that they 
filled the chambers to the height of a foot or more from the floor. The documents 
thus discovered at Nineveh probably exceed in amount of writing all that has yet 
been afforded by the monuments of Egypt" (Layard's Nineveh). To Austen Henry 
Layard, an English archseologist, we are chiefly indebted for the wonderful dis- 
cov'eriesraade in exploring the mounds which mark the site of Nineveh. The British 
Museum has a magnificent collection of Assyrian antiquities recovered from these 
mounds, whole rooms being lined with the alabaster slabs exhumed from the ruins 
of the palaces of Asshurizirpal at Nimroud, Sennacherib and his grandson Asshur- 
banipal at Koyunjik, and Sargon at Khorsabad. Most of the remains of Sargon's 
palace, however, are deposited in the Louvre at Paris, having been excavated for the 
L^rench government by M. Botta, who has the honor of having made (in 1843) the 
lirst discovery of an Assyrian monument, 

2 Borsippa was a town near Babylon. Some authorities include the ruins of this 
temple, now called the Birs-i-Nimrud, within the outer wall of Babylon, and believe 
it to have been the true Temple of Belus (p. 59), if not tlie actual Tower of Babel. 
A mound called Babil, near the Great Palace, is the other disputed site. 



56 



BABYLONIA AND ASSYRIA. 



silver stages seem to have been covered with thin plates of those 
metals. Either the sides or the angles of these structures exactly 
faced the cardinal points, and the base was strengthened by brick 
buttresses scientifically arranged. The royal name and titles were 
engraved upon each building-brick. 




BABYLONIAN BRICK. 



TheAssyrians msidie their temples simple adjuncts to their palaces, 
where they were used as observatories. Here the priestly astrolo- 
gers consulted the stars, and no enterprise was undertaken, however 
it might otherwise promise success, unless the heavens were de- 
clared favorable. Following the example of their Chaldean instruc- 
tors, the Assyrians continued to build with brick, though they had 
an abundance of excellent stone. Their edifices, placed, like those 
in Chaldea, upon high artificial mounds of earth, were incased with 
bricks used while still soft, so that they adhered to one another 
without cement, and formed a single, compact mass. As their 
palaces were constructed of this same weak material, which was 
liable to disintegrate within twenty or thirty years,they were obliged 
to make the walls enormously thick, the halls narrow and low as 
compared with their length, and to limit the height to one story. 
The roof was loaded with earth as a protection from the fierce 
summer sun and the heavy winter rains. Their building-plan was 
always the same. Around immense square courts were arranged 
halls or chambers of different sizes opening into one another. These 
halls, though never more than 40 feet wide, were sometimes 180 feet 



THE CIVILIZATION. 



57 



in length. The sides were lined with alabaster slabs, from eight to 
fifteen feet high, covered with elaborate sculptures illustrating the 
sports, prowess, and religious devotion of the king ; above these 
were enameled bricks. The 
court-yards were paved 
with chiseled stone or 
painted bricks, and the 
beams of Lebanon cedar 
were sometimes overlaid 
with silver or gold. The 
courts themselves were or- 
namented by gigantic sculp- 
tures, and the artificial 
mound was edged by a ter- 
raced wall. Sennacherib's 
palace at Koyunjik was 
only second in size and 
grandeur to the palace tem- 
ple at Karnak. The ruling 
idea in Assyrian architec- 
ture, however, was not, as in 
the Egyptian, that of mag- 
nitude, much less of dura- 
bility, but rather of close 
and finished ornamenta- 
tion; the bas-reliefs being 
wrought out with a minute- 
ness of detail which ex- 
tended to the flowers and 
rosettes on a king's gar- 
ment or the intricate pat- 
tern of his carved footstool. 
But Assyrian alabaster was 
far easier to manage than 
Egyptian granite, and where 
masses of hard stone like 
basalt were used, to which 
the Egyptians would give the finish of a cameo, the Assyrians pro- 
duced only coarse and awkward effects. A few stone obelisks have 
been found — one only, the Black Obelisk of Nimroud, being in per- 
fect preservation. In statuary, the Assyrians signally failed, and in 




BLACK OBELISK FROM NIMROUD. 



58 BABYLONIA AND ASSYRIA. 

drawing they had no better idea of perspective than the Egyptians. 
In their water-scenes the fishes are as large as the ships, and the 
birds in the woods are half as tall as the men who hunt them. 
They excelled in bas-relief, in which they profusely detailed their 
religious ideas, home life, and royal greatness. As compared 
with Egyptian art,i the Assyrian was more progressive, and had 
greater freedom, variety, and taste. 

Walls, Temple, Palaces, and Hanging Gardens of Babylon. — The 
wall of this great city formed a square, each side of which was, 
according to Herodotus, 14 miles long, 85 feet thick, and 335 feet 
high.2 Twenty- five brass gates opened from each of the four sides 
upon straight, wide streets, which extended across the city, dividing 
it into squares. A space was left free from buildings for some dis- 
tance next the walls ; within that, beautiful gardens, orchards, and 
fields alternated with lofty dwellings. The broad Euphrates, in- 
stead of skirting the city as did the Tigris at Nineveh, ran midway 
through the town, and was guarded by two brick walls with brass 
gates opening upon steps which led down to the water. The 
river-banks were lined throughout with brick-and-bitumen quays, 
and the stream was crossed by ferries, and, during the day, by a 
movable drawbridge resting on stone piers. 

On either side of the Euphrates rose a majestic palace, built upon 
a high platform, and surrounded by triple walls a quarter of a 
mile apart. The outer wall of the larger palace was nearly seven 
miles in circumference. The inner walls were faced with enameled 
brick, representing hunting scenes in gayly colored figures larger 
than life. The glory of the palace was its Hanging Gardens, imi- 
tated from those in Assyria, and built by Nebuchadnezzar to please 
his Median queen, who pined for her native hills. They consisted 
of a series of platforms resting on arches, and rising one above the 
other till the summit overtopped the city walls. The soil with 
which they were covered was deep enough to sustain not only 
flowers and shrubs, but the largest trees, so that the effect was that 
of a mountain clothed m verdure. The structure was ascended by 
broad stairs, and on the several terraces, among fountains, groves, 
and fragrant shrubs, were stately apartments, in whose cool shade 



1 The Chaldean tomb (p. 65) is without inscription, bas-relief, or painting (contrast 
with Egyptian tomb). No Assyrian sepulcher has yet (1892) been found. 

2 Other authorities reduce this estimate. In Alexander's time the wall still stood 
over seventy feet high. Curtius asserts that "nine tenths of Babylon consisted of 
gardens, parks, fields, and orchards." 



i 



THE CIVILIZATION. 59 

the queen might rest while making the tour of her novel pleasure- 
ground. The Temple ofBelus was also surrounded by a wall having 
brass gates. Within the sacred mclosure, but outside the building, 
were two altars for sacrifice, one of stone and one of gold. At the 
base of the tower — which was a huge, solid mass of brick- work — 
was a chapel containing a sitting image of Bel, a golden stand and 
table, and a human figure eighteen feet high, made of soUd gold. 
The ascent was from the outside, and on the summit was the sacred 
shrine, containing three great golden images of Bel, Beltis, and 
Ishtar (p. 61). There were also two golden lions, two enormous 
silver serpents, and a golden table forty feet long and fifteen broad, 
besides drinking- cups, censers, and a golden bowl for each deity. 

Practical Arts and Inventions. — Agriculture was carried to a 
high degree of perfection in both countries, and the system of ir- 
rigation was so complete that it has been said '^not a drop of water 
was allowed to be lost." Their brilliantly dyed and ivoven stuffs, 
especially the Babylonian carpets, were celebrated throughout the 
ancient world ; and the elaborate designs of their embroideries 
served as models for the earliest Grecian vases. In metal-work they 
were far advanced, and they must have possessed the art of casting 
vast masses, since their town and palace gates are said to have been 
of bronze. Where great strength was required, as in the legs of 
tripods and tables, the bronze was cast over iron, an ingenious art 
unknown to moderns until it was learned and imitated from Assyrian 
antiquities. The beams and furniture of palaces were often cased 
with bronze, and long bronze friezes with fantastic figures in relief 
adorned the palace halls. Gold, silver, and bronze vases^ beautifully 
chased, were important articles of commerce, as was also the 
Assyi'ian pottery, which, being enameled by an entirely different 
process from that of Egypt, and having a finer paste, brighter hue, 
and thinner body, was largely exported to the latter country during 
the XVIII^^* dynasty. Mineral tints were used for coloring. 
Assyrian terra cotta was remarkably fine and pure. 

Transparent glass was in use in the time of Sargon. A rock- 
crystal lens has been found at Nimroud, the only object of its kind 
as yet discovered among the remains of antiquity. In gem -cutting 
the Assyrians decidedly excelled the Egyptians, and the exceeding 
minuteness of some work on seals implies the use of powerful 
magnifiers. 

Most of the mechanical powers whereby heavy weights have com- 
monly been moved and raised among civilized nations were under- 



60 BABYLONIA AND ASSYRIA. 

stood. 1 The Assyrians imported their steel and iron tools from the 
neighboring provinces of the Caucasus, where steel had long been 
manufactured ; the carved ivories which ornamented their palaces 
probably came from Phoenicia. It will be seen that in all the 
common arts and appliances of life the Assyrians were at least 
on a par with the Egyptians, while in taste they greatly excelled 
not only that nation, but all the Orientals. It must not be for- 
gotten, however, that Egyptian civilization was over a thousand 
years old when Assyria was in its infancy. 



3. THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 

General Character. — The Assyrians were brave, cruel, 2 and aggres- 
sive. Isaiah calls them a '' fierce people," and Nahum speaks of Nine- 
veh as ''full of lies and robbery." The mixed people of Babylonia 
were more scholarly and less warlike than the purely Semitic Assyr- 
ians, but they, also, were "terrible and dreadful, going through the 
breadth of the land" with chariots "like the whirlwind," and "horses 
swifter than the leopards and more fierce than the evening wolves." 
In war savage and pitiless, in peace they were " tender and delicate, 
given to pleasures, exceeding in dyed attire upon their heads." Their 
covetousness and luxurious indulgences became a proverb. They were 
fond of giving banquets in their brilliantly painted saloons, where 
their visitors, clothed in scarlet robes and resplendent in cosmetics 
and jewelry, trod on carpets which were the envy of the ancient world, 
and were served with rich meats and luscious fruits on gold and silver 
plates. In Babylonia the guests were not formally garlanded, as in 
Egypt, but a profusion of flowers in elegant vases adorned the rooms. 
Meantime, while the air was filled with music and heavy with per- 
fumes, the merry revelers drank deeply of the abundant wine, and 
loudly sang the praises of their favorite gods. 

In pleasant contrast to their dissipation appear their learning, enter, 

1 The Assyrians wrought all the elaborate carvings of their colossi before moving 
them. They then stood the figure on a wooden sledge, supporting it by heavy frame- 
work, and bracing it with ropes and beams. The sledge was moved over rollers by 
gangs of men, levers and wedges being used to facilitate its progress. The entire 
process of transporting a colossal stone bull is graphically pictured in an extensive 
bas-relief found at Koyunjik, and now in the British Museum. 

2 The horrible atrocities inflicted on war captives are exultantly detailed on royal 
inscriptions. Tt is significant of the two civilizations that wliile Assyrian kings were 
thus mutilating and flaying alive their defenseless prisoners, Egypt had abolished the 
death penalty as a punishment lor crime. 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 



61 



prise, and honesty in trade. In their intercourse with strangers they 
are said to have cultivated calmness of manner, a virtue probably not 
natural to them, but which was founded upon an intense pride in 
their superior culture and scientific attainments. 

Religion. — The Assyrians and Babylonians were both, in an idola- 
trous way, religious nations, though much less so than the Egyptians. 
The sun, moon, and planets were conspicuous among their gods. 
Their ideas of one First Cause or Deity were even more obscure than 
those of the Egyptians, and although II or lia, who stood at the head 
of the Chaldean Pantheon, was vaguely considered as the fount or 
origin of Deity, there were several other self-originated gods, each 
supreme over his own sphere. II was too dimly comprehended to be 
popular, and had apparently no temple in Chaldea. 

Two Triads were next in rank. The first comprised Ana, the lord 
of spirits and demons, who represented original chaos; Bel or Bel- 
Nimrod, the hunter, lord and organizer of the world ; and Roa, the 
lord of the abyss, and regulator of the universe. The 
second triad embraced Sin, the moon-god ; San (called in 
Assyria Shamas), the sun -god ; and Vul, the air-god. Each 
god had a wife, who received her share of divine honors. 
After these came the five planetary deities : Nin or Saturn, 
sometimes called the fish-god — his emblem in Assyria 
being the man-bull ; Bel-Merodach or Jupiter ; Nergal 
or Mars — the man-lion of Assyria ; Ishtar or Venus ; and 
Nebo or Mercury. A host of inferior gods made up the 
Pantheon, In the later Babylonian empire, Bel, Mero- 
dach, Nebo, and Nergal were the favorite deities, the last 
two receiving especial worship at Babylon. The most popular god- 
desses were Beltis, wife of Bel-Nimrod, and ^' mother of the great 
gods;" and Ishtar, "queen of the gods," who shared with Beltis the 
titles of goddess of fertility, of war, and of hunting.! The gods were 
symbolized by pictorial emblems, and also by mystic numbers. Thus, 




MOONGOD. 
(From a Cyl- 
inder ) 



Hoa = 40, emblem a serpent 



emblem the moon 




Sin = 30, 



W 



San = 20, emblem the sun 




1 In all the Pagan religions the characteristics of one deity often trench upon 
those of another, and in Chaldea the most exalted epithets were divided between a 
number of gods. Thus, Bel is the "father of the gods, the king of the spirits; " Ana 
and Merodach are each "the original chief" and "the most ancient;" Nebo is the 
"lord of lords, who has no equal in power;" Sin is "the king of the gods and the 
lord of spirits," etc. The same symbol also stands for different gods. Hoa and Nebo, 
each as the " god of intelligence," " teacher and instructor of men," have for one of 
their emblems the wedge or arrowhead characters used in cuneiform writing. 



62 BABYLONIA AND ASSYRIA. 

Among the emblems symbolizing other, and to us unknown, gods, is 
a double cross, generally repeated three times. Eeligious etiquette 
erected honorary shrines to outside gods in temples consecrated to one 
chosen favorite ; and a Babylonian gentleman wore on his cylinder 
seal, besides the emblem of his chosen god patron, the complimentary 
symbols of other deities. 

In Assyria, II was known as Asshur,"^ and was the supreme object 
of worship. He was the guardian deity of king and country, and in 
the sculptures his emblem is always seen near the monarch. In the 
midst of battle, in processions of victory, in public worship, or in the 
pleasures of the chase, Asshur hovers over the scene, pointing his own 
arrow at the king's enemies, uplifting his hand with the king in wor- 
ship, or spreading his wings protectingly over the scene of enjoyment. 
In bas-reliefs representing worship, there also appear a "sacred tree," 
whose true symbolism is unknown, 2 and winged eagle-headed deities 
or genii who hand to the king mysterious fruit from a sacred basket. 
Sin and Sliamas were highly honored in Assyria, and their emblems 
were worn by the king on his neck. Upon the cylinders they are 
conjoined, the sun resting in the crescent of the moon. 

Bel was also a favorite god j 3 "but Nin and Nergal, the winged bull 
and lion, the gods whc "made sharp the weapons" of kings, and who 
presided over war and hunting, were most devotedly worshiped. The 
race of kings was traditionally derived from Nin, and his name was 
given to the mighty capital (Nineveh). 

Below the Great Gods were countless inferior ones, each city having 
its local deities which elsewhere received small respect. Good and 
evil spirits were represented as perpetually warring with one another. 
Pestilence, fever, and all the ills of life, were personified, and man 
was like a bewildered traveler in a strange land, exposed to a host of 
imseen foes, whom he could subdue only by charms and exorcisms. 

The Assyrians apparently had no set religious festivals. When a 
feast was to be held in honor of any god, the king made special proc- 
lamation. During a fast, not only king, nobles, and people abstained 
from food and drink, clothed themselves in sackcloth, and sprinkled 

1 In the original language, the name of the country, of the first capital, and the 
term " an Assyrian," are all identical with the name of this god. 

2 Recent theories identifying the Egyptian lotus with all classic ornamentation 
assert that the " sacred tree " was a conventional arrangement of lotus palmettes 
and buds, tliat the mysterious cone-like fruit was a lotus-hud, and that the Assyrian 
*' rosette " was the ovary stigma of the lotus-flower,— all heing symbols of sun-worship. 
(See Goody ear's Grammar of the Lotus.) 

3 It was common for both Assyrian and Babylonian kings to signify their favorite 
god by associating his name with their own. The gods most frequently allied 
with royal names in Assyria were Asshur, Bel, and Nebo; in Babylonia, Neboand 
Merodach. 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 



63 



ashes on their heads, but all the animals within the city walls were 
made to join in the penitential observance (see Jonah iii. 5-9). 

Image Worship. — The stone, clay, and metal images which adorned 
the temple shrines of Assyria and Babylonia were worshiped as real 
gods. So identified was a divinity with its idol, that, in the inscrip- 
tions of kings where the great gods were invoked in turn, the images 
of the same deity placed in different temples were often separately 
addressed, as Ishtar of Babylon, Ishtar of Arbela, Ishtar of Nineveh, 
etc. In worship, living sacrifices and offerings were made and obla- 
tions poured, the king taking the chief position, instead of the priest, 
as in Egypt. 

Curious Babylonish Customs.— If we are to believe Herodotus, the 
Babylonians buried their dead in honey, and married their daughters 
by auction, the money brought by the handsome ones being given as 
a dowry to their less favored sisters. The marriage festival took place 
once a year, and no father could give 
his daughter at any other time or in 
any other way. Each bride received a 
clay model of an olive, on which were 
inscribed her name and that of her hus- 
band, with the date of the ceremony; 
this was to be worn on her neck. 
Unlike the Egyptians, the— Babylonians 
had no regular physicians ; the sick 
and infirm were brought out into the 
market-place, where the passers-by 
prescribed remedies which had proved 
effectual in their own experience or 
that of their friends ; it being against 
the law to pass by a sick person without 
inquiring into the nature of his disease. Every summer the slaves 
had a festival, called Sacees, when for five days they took command 
of their masters, one of them, clothed in a royal robe, receiving the 
honors of a king. 





ASSYRIAN LAMPS. 



SCENES IN REAL LIFE. 



Scene I. — A Chaldean Home. — Let us visit the home of an ancient 
Chaldean as we should have found it over 3500 years ago. Before us 
rises a high brick platform, supporting an irregular cross-shaped house 
built of burnt or sun-dried bricks cemented with mud or bitumen. 
The outside is gayly adorned with colored terra-cotta cones embedded 
in mud or plaster. Entering, we find long, narrow rooms opening one 



64 



BABYLONIA AND ASSYRIA. 



into another. If there are windows, they are set high, near the roof or 
ceiling. Upon the plastered walls, which are often broken by little 
recesses, are cuneiform inscriptions, varied by red, black, and white 
bands, or rude, bright-red figures of men and birds. ^ The chairs or 
stools, of soft, light date-wood, have legs modeled after those of an ox. 
The invaluable palm-tree, as useful in Chaldea as in Egypt, has not 
only supplied the table itself, but much of the food upon it. Its fresh 
or dried fruit appears as bread or sweetmeats ; its sap, as wine, vin- 
egar, and honey. The tableware is clay or bronze. The vases which 

contain the wine are mostly 
of coarse clay mixed with 
chopped straw; but here 
and there one of a finer 
glaze shows the work of the 
potter's wheel and an idea 
of beauty. The master of 
the house wears a long linen 
robe, elaborately striped, 
flounced, and fringed, which, 
passing over one shoulder, 
leaves the other bare, and 
falls to his feet. His beard 
is long and straight, and 
his hair either gathered in a roll at the back of his head or worn 
in long curls. He does not despise jewelry on his own person, and 
his wife revels in armlets and bracelets, and in rings for the fingers 
and toes. Bronze and iron — ^which is so rare as to be a precious 
metal — are affected most by the Chaldean belle, but her ornaments are 
also of shell, agate, and sometimes of gold. For the common people, 
a short tunic tied around the waist and reaching to the knee is a per- 
petual fashion, suitable for a temperature which ranges from 100° to 
130° F. in summer. In the severest winter season, when the ther- 
mometer falls to 30° above zero, the Chaldean hunter dons an extra 
wrap, which covers his shoulders and falls below his tunic ; then, 
barefooted, and with a skull-cap or a camel's-hair band on his head, 
he goes out, with his bronze arrowhead and bronze or flint knife, to 
shoot and dissect the wild boar. Our Chaldean gentleman makes out 




SIGNET CYLINDER OF URUCH.2 

(The earliest Chaldean king, of whom many definite re- 
mains have been found. Date, perhaps, 2800 b. c. See 
p. 45.) 



1 This description is based upon the only two Chaldean residences which have 
as yet, so far as is known, been exhumed. They are supposed to date from between 
1800 and 1600 B. c. 

2 Uruch, King of Ur, lived perhaps before Babylon was founded. He was the first 
to call himself " King of Shumir and Accad." From his cylinder we learn that the 
Chaldeans at this early date dressed in delicate fabricfi elaborately trimmed, and 
had tastefully fashioned household furniture. 




THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 65 

a deed or writes a letter with a small bronze or ivory tool suited to his 
minute, cuneiform script, on a bit of moist clay shaped like a tiny 
pillow (p. 52). He signs it by rolling across the face the little engraved 
jasper or chalcedony cylinder, which he wears at- 
tached by a string to his wrist. Having baked it, 
he incloses it in a thin clay envelope, upon which 
he repeats his message or contract, and bakes it 
again. When the Chaldean dies, his friends shroud 
him in fine linen, and incase him in two large stone 
jars, so that the upper part of his body rests in one, '^ cylinder seal. 
and the lower part in the other, after which they cement the two jars 
together with mud or bitumen ; or they lay him upon a brick plat- 
form with a reed matting beneath him, and place over him a huge, 
burnt-clay cover, — a marvel of pottery, formed of a single piece, and 
shaped like a modern tureen cover ; or they put him on the mat in the 
family arched vault, pillowing his head on a sun-dried brick covered 
with a tapestry cushion. About him they arrange his ornaments and 
favorite implements ; vases of wine are within his reach, and in the 
palm of his left hand they rest a bronze or copper bowl filled with 
dates or other food to strengthen him in his mysterious journey 
through the silent land. 

Scene II. — A Morning in Nineveh. — The Assyrian was a cedar in 
Lebanon, exalted above all the trees of the field, so that all the trees 
that were in the garden of God envied him, and not one was like unto 
him in his beauty (Ezek. xxxi.)- Six centuries and a half have 
passed since Chaldea was humbled by her northern neighbor; and 
Assyria, not dreaming that her own fall is so near, is in the fullness 
of her splendor and arrogance. It is about the year 650 B. c, and 
the proud Asshurbanipal is on the throne — Asshurbanipal, who has 
subdued the land of the Pyramids and the Labyrinth, and made 
Karnak and Luxor mere adjuncts to his glory. Nineveh, with her 
great walls one hundred feet in height, upon which three chariots can 
run abreast, lies before us. The bright spring sun of the Orient looks 
down upon a country luxuriant with a rich but short-lived verdure. 
Green myrtles and blossoming oleanders fringe the swollen streams, 
and the air is filled with the sweet odors of the citron-trees. The 
morning fog has loaded the dwarf oak with manna, and the rains have 
crowded the land with flowers. The towers, two hundred feet high, 
which mark the various city gates, throw long shadows over rows of 
windowless houses, topped with open domes or high, steep, cone-like 
roofs. Out from these houses come the people, dressed according to 
their several stations : bareheaded and barefooted laborers, clothed in 
one garment, a plain, short-sleeved tunic reaching to the knee ; pros- 
perous folk in sandals and fringed tunics, and the wealthy, in long 



66 



BABYLONIA AND ASSYRIA. 




THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 



67 



fringed and elegantly girdled robes. Only the higher orders are privi- 
leged to cover their heads with a cap, but all, even the meanest, glory in 
long, elaborately dressed hair. In the dwellings of the rich we may see 
furniture of elegant design : canopied beds and couches, and curtains 
of costly tapestry ; carved stools and tables with feet fashioned like 
gazelle-hoofs ; and, in the palace, luxurious chairs, and articles sacred 
to gods and the king. In the west end of the city, abutting the swift- 
flowing Tigris, is a high plat- 
form covering one hundred 
acres, on which stands the 
magnificent palace of Asshur- 
banipal. Near it is the still 
larger one built by Sennach- 
erib, his grandfather, and 
about it are parks and hanging 
gardens. The palaces have 
immense portals guarded by 
colossal winged and human- 
headed bulls and lions ; great 
court-yards paved with elc 
gantly patterned slabs ; and 
arched doorways, elaborately 
sculptured and faced by eagle- 
headed deities. We miss the 

warm, glowing colors so generously lavished on Egyptian temples. 
There are traces of the painter, but his tints are more subdued and 
more sparingly used. It is the triumphant day of the sculptor and the 
enameler. Asshurbanipal sits on his carved chair, arrayed in his em- 
broidered robe and mantle. On his breast rests a large circular orna- 
ment wrought with sacred emblems ; golden rosettes glitter on his red- 
and-white tiara, and rosettes and crescents adorn his shoes. He wears 
a sword and daggers, and holds a golden scepter. Necklaces, armlets, 
bracelets, and ear-rings add to his costume. Behind him is his parasol- 
bearer, grasping with both hands a tall, thick pole supporting a fringed 
and curtained shade. His Grand Vizier — who interprets his will to 
the people, and whose dress approaches his own in magnificence — 
stands before him in an attitude of passive reverence to receive the 
royal orders ; the scribes are waiting to record the mandate, and a 
host of attendants are at hand to perform it. 

Scene III. — A Boyal Lion-hunt. — To-day it is a lion-hunt. At 
the palace gates, surrounded by a waiting retinue, stands the king's 
chariot, headed by three richly caparisoned horses, champing bronze 
bits and gayly tinkling the bells on their tasseled collars, while grooms 
hold other horses to be placed before the chariots of high officials, after 




COLOSSAL HUMAN-HEADED WINGED BULL. 



68 BABYLONIA AND ASSYRIA. 

the monarch shall have mounted. As the king steps into the box-like 
chariot, his two favorite eunuchs adjust the well-stocked quivers, put 
in the long spears, and enter behind him ; the charioteer loosens the 
reins, and the horses start at full speed. At the park, or ''paradise," 
a large circuit is inclosed by a double rampart of spearmen and archers, 
and a row of hounds held in leashes. Here the lions kept for the 
king's sport wait in their cages. Having arrived at the park and 
received a ceremonious salute, the king gives the order to release the 
wild beasts. Cautiously creeping out from their cages, they seem at 
first to seek escape ; but the spearmen's large shields and bristling 
weapons dazzle their eyes ; the fierce dogs, struggling in their leashes, 
howl in their ears ; and the king's well-aimed arrows quickly enrage 
them to combat. Swifter and swifter fly the darts. The desperate 
beasts spring at the chariot sides only to receive death-thrusts from 
the spears of the attendants, while the excited king shoots rapidly on 




THE ROYAL LION-HUKT (FROM THE SCULPTURES). 

(n front. Now one has seized the chariot-wheel with his huge paws, 
and grinds it madly with his teeth ; but he, too, falls in convulsions 
to the ground. The sport fires the blood of the fierce Asshurbanipal. 
He jumps from his chariot, orders fresh lions to be released, grasps 
his long spear, selects the most ferocious for a hand-to-hand combat, 
furiously dispatches him, and, amid the deafening shouts of his ad- 
miring courtiers, proclaims his royal content. The hunt is over ; the 
dead lions have been collected for the king's inspection, and are now 
borne on the shoulders of men in a grand procession to the palace, 
whither the king precedes them. The chief otficers of the royal house- 
hold come out to welcome him ; the cup-bearer brings wine, and, while 
the king refreshes himself, busily plies his long fly-whisk about the 
royal head, the musicians meantime playing merrily upon their harps. 
It remains to ofl'er the finest and bravest of the game to the god of the 
chase ; and four of the largest lions are aceoi'dingly selected and 
arranged side by side before the altar. The king and his attendants, 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 69 

all keeping time to formal music, march, in stately majesty to the 
shrine, where Asshurbanipal raises the sacred cup to his lips, and 
slowly pours the solemn libation. A new sculpture depicting the grand 
event of the day is ordered, and beneath it is inscribed, — 

" I, Asshurbanipal, king of the nations, king of Assyria, in my great courage, 
fighting on foot with a lion terrible for its size, seized him by the ear, and in the 
name of Asshur and of Ishtar, Goddess of War, with the spear that was in my hand 
I terminated his life." 

Scene IV. — Jsshurhanijml going to War. — The king goes to war in 
his chariot, dressed in his most magnificent attire, and attended by a 
retinue of fan-bearers, parasol-bearers, bow, quiver, and mace-bearers. 
About these gather his body-guard of foot-spearmen, each one bran- 
dishing a tall spear and protected by scale-armor, a pointed helmet, 
and a great metal shield. The detachment of horse-archers which 
follows is also dressed in coats of mail, leather breeches, and jack- 
boots. Before and behind the royal cortege stretches the army — a vast 
array of glancing helmets, spears, shields, and battle-axes; war- 
riors in chariots, on horse, and on foot ; heavy-armed archers in 
helmet and armor, with the strung bow on the shoulders and the 
highly decorated quiver filled with bronze or iron-headed arrows on 
the back ; light-armed archers with embroidered head-bands and short 
tunics, and bare arms, limbs, and feet; spearmen who carry great 
wicker shields, which are made, in ease of need, to join and furnish 
boats ; and troops of slingers, mace-bearers, and ax-bearers. The 
massive throne of the king is in the cavalcade ; upon this, when the 
battle or siege is ended, he will sit in great state to receive the prisoners 
and spoil. Here, too, are his drinking-cups and washing-bowls, his 
low-wheeled pleasure-chair, his dressing-table, and other toilet lux- 
uries. Battering-rams, scaling-ladders, baggage-carts, and the usual 
paraphernalia of a great army make up the rear, where also in carefully 
closed arahas are the king's wives, who, with the whole court, follow 
him to war. The Ninevites come out in crowds to see the start ; the 
musicians — ^who, however, remain at home — play a brisk farewell on 
double-pipes, harps, and drum ; the women and children, standing in 
procession, clap their hands and sing; and so, amid ''the noise of the 
rattling of the wheels, and of the prancing horses, and of the jumping 
chariots " (Nahum iii. 2), the Assyrian army sets off. 

Scene V. — A Royal Banquet. — After many days the host comes 
back victorious (the sculptors never record defeats), bringing great 
spoil of gold, silver, and fine furniture, countless oxen, sheep, horses, 
and camels, prisoners of war, and captured foreign gods. Rejoicing 
and festivities abound. A royal feast is given in the most magnificent 
of the sculptured halls, where the tables glitter with gold and silver 
stands laden with dried locusts, pomegranates, grapes, and citrons. 



70 



BABYLONIA AND ASSYRIA. 



There are ehoiee meats, hare, and game-birds, and an abundance of 
mixed wine in the huge vases from which the busy attendants fill the 
beakers of the guests. Afterward the king invites 
the queen from her seclusion in the beautiful harem 
to sup with him in the garden. At this banquet 
the luxurious Asshurbanipal reclines on a couch, 
leaning his left elbow on a cushioned pillow, and 
holding in his hand a lotus, here, as in Egypt, the 
sacred flower. A table with dishes of incense stands 
by his couch, at the foot of which sits his hand- 
some queen. Her tunic is fringed and patterned in 
the elaborate Assyrian style, and she is resplendent 
with jewelry. A grape-vine shelters the royal pair, 
and behind each of them stand two fan-bearers 
with long brushes, scattering the troublesome flies. 
Meantime the king and queen sip wine from their 
golden cups ; the attendants bring in fresh fruits ; 
the harpers play soft music ; and, to complete the 
triumph of the feast, from a neighboring tree sur- 
rounded by hungry vultures dangles the severed head of the king's 
newly conquered enemy. 




ASSYRIAN KING AND 
ATTENDANTS. 



4. SUMMARY. 



1. Political History. — Our earliest glimpse of Chaldea is of a Tu- 
ranian people in temple cities. Later come the Semites, a nomadic 
people, who migrate northward, and finally build the Assyrian cities 
upon the Tigris. Henceforth war rages between the rival sections, and 
the seat of power fluctuates between Babylon and Nineveh. About 
1300 B. c. Babylon is overwhelmed, and for nearly 700 years Nineveh 
is the seat of empire. Here the Sargonidee — Sennacherib, Esarhaddon, 
and Asshurbanipal — develop the Golden Age of Assyrian rule. The 
Babylonians, however, continue to revolt, and in 747 b. c. Nabonassar 
ascends the Babylonian throne, destroys the records of all the kings 
before his time, and establishes a new era from which to reckon dates. 
In 606 B. c. Nineveh is finally overthrown by the Babylonians and the 
Medes, and Nabopolassar establishes the second Babylonian Empire. 
Nebuchadnezzar subdues the surrounding nations, humiliates Egypt, 
captures Tyre, crushes Judea, and with his captives brought back to 
Babylon makes that city the marvel of all eyes. It is, however, the 
last of her glory. Within the next quarter of a century Babylon is 
taken by the stratagem of Cyrus the Great, Belshazzar is slain, and the 
mighty city falls, never again to rise to her ancient glory. 



SUMMARY. 



71 



2. Civilization. — Tlie Early Chaldeans build vast temples of sun- 
dried brick cemented with bitumen ; write in cuneiform characters on 
clay tablets ; engrave signet cylinders ; use implements of stone, flint, 
and bronze ; manufacture cloth ; make boats and navigate the sea. 
They are learned in astronomy and arithmetic ; discover the equinoctial 
precession (Steele's Astronomy, p. 121); divide the day into twenty- 
four hours ; draw maps, record phenomena, invent dials, and calculate 
a table of squares. They place their houses on high platforms, make 
their furniture of date-wood, and use tableware of clay or bronze. 
The palm-tree furnishes them food. Their dead are buried in large 
clay jars, or in dish-covered tombs, or are laid to rest in arched brick 
vaults. 




^ yy 'ys^^^^ 



INTEKIOR COUKT-yARD OF A MODERN ORIENTAL HOUSE 



Tlie Assyrians, their Semitic conquerors, are a fierce, warlike race, 
skillful in agriculture, in blowing glass and shaping pottery, in casting 
and embossing metals, and in engraving gems. They dye, weave, 
and are superior in plastic art. They build great palaces, adorning 
them with sculptured alabaster slabs, colossal bulls and lions, paved 
courts, and eagle-headed deities. They, too, wi-ite upon clay tablets, 
and cover terra-cotta cylinders with cuneiform inscriptions. Their 
principal gods are the heavenly bodies. They do not worship animals, 
like the Egyptians, but place images of clay, stone, or metal in their 
temples, and treat them as real deities. Magic and sorcery abound. 
There is no caste among the people, but all are at the mercy of the 
king. Women are not respected as in Egypt, and they live secluded 
in their own apartments. Clay books are collected and libraries 
founded, but most of the learning comes from the conquered race, and 
the Chaldean is the classic language. 



72 



BABYLONIA AND ASSYRIA. 



TJie Babylonians are a hixurioiis people. Industries flourisTi and 
commerce is extensive. Babylonian robes and tapestries surpass all 
others in texture and hue. Far below Assyria in the art of sculptured 
bas-relief, Babylonia excels in brick-enameling, and is greatly the supe- 




THE SITE OF ANCIENT BABYLON. 

rior in originality of invention, literary culture, and scientific attain- 
ment. From her Assyria draws her learning, her architecture, her 
religion, her legal forms, and many of her customs. 

" In Babylonia almost every branch of science made a beginning. She was the 
source to which the entire stream of Eastern civilization may be traced. It is 
scarcely too much to say that, but for Babylon, real civilization might not even yet 
have dawned upon the earth, and mankind might never have advanced beyond that 
spurious and false form of it which in Egypt, India, China, Japan, Mexico, and 
Peru, contented the aspirations of the people."— ^azolmson's Ancient Monarchies. 



READING REFERENCES. 



Bawlinson'' 8 History of A ncient Monarchies.— Fergusson''8 History of A rcJiiteeture, 
and Palaces of Nineveh and Persepolis Restored.— Layard' s 3Ionuments of Nineveh^ 
and Nineveh and its Remains.— Records of the Past {New Series).— Sayce's Babylonian 
Literature ; Assyria, its Princes, Priests, and People ; and Fresh Lights from An- 
cient Monuments.— Perrot and Chipiez's History of Art in Chaldea and Assyria.— 
Qeorge Smith's Chaldean Account of Genesis {Revised); Assyrian Discoveries ; and 
Early History of Assyria.— Loftus's Chaldea and Susiana.—Also the Oeneral Ancient 
Histories named on p. 44. 

CHRONOLOGY. 

B. C. 

SargonI 38001 

Ur-6a(Uruch) 2800? 

Khammuragus 2280? 

Rise of Assyria 1300 

Era of Nabonassar 747 

Fall of Nineveh 6061 

Cyrus captured Babylon 538 

Alexander captured Babylon 331 



PHOENICIA. 



The Phoenicians were Semites. They inhabited a bar- 
ren strip of land on the eastern shore of the Mediterranean, 
not more than one hundred and eighty miles long and 
a dozen broad. The country was never united under one 
king, but each city was a sovereignty by itself. A powerful 
aristocracy was connected with these little monarchies, but 
the bulk of the people were slaves brought from foreign 
countries. The principal cities were Sidon and Tyre,^ 
which successively exercised a controlling influence over the 
others. The chief defense of the Phoenicians lay in their 
naval power. Situated midway between the east, and the 
west, and at the junction of three continents, they carried 
on the trade of the world.^ The Mediterranean became the 
mere highway of their commerce. They passed the Strait 
of Gibraltar on one hand, and reached India on the other. 

They settled Cyprus, Sicily, and Sardinia. In Spain 
they founded Gades (now Cadiz) ; and in Africa, Utica and 
Carthage, the latter destined to be in time the dreaded rival 
of Rome. They planted depots on the Persian Gidf and the 

Geographical Questions.— Boxxnd. Phoenicia. Locate Tyre; Sidon. Name the 
principal Phoenician colonies. Where was Carthage? Utica? Tarshish? Gades? 
The Pillars of Hercules? 

1 Tyre, which was founded by Sidonians, has been called the Daughter of Sidon 
and the Mother of Carthage. 

2 Read the 27th chapter of Ezekiel for a graphic account of the Phoenician com- 
merce in his day. 



74 



PHOENICIA, 



Red Sea. They obtained tin from the British Isles, amber 
from the Baltic,^ silver from Tarshish (southern Spain), and 




gold from Ophir (southeastern Arabia). In connection with 
their maritime trade they established great commercial 



1 Over tlieir land trade routes. Amber also existed near Sidon. They carefully- 
concealed the source of their supplies. An outward-hound Phoenician captain once 
found himself followed by a Roman ship. To preserve his secret and destroy his 
follower, he ran his own vessel on the rocks. The government made up his loss. 



1000 B. c] 



PHCENICIA. 



75 



routes by wMch. their merchants penetrated the interior of 
Europe and Asia. With the growth of Carthage and the 
rising power of Greece they lost their naval supremacy. 
But the land traffic of Asia remained in their hands ; and 
their caravans, following the main traveled route through 
Palmyra, Baalbec, and Babylon, permeated aU the Orient. 




THE RUINS OF ANCIENT TYRE. 



Loss of Independence. — Rich merchant cities were 
tempting prizes in those days of strife. From about 850 
B. c, Phoenicia became the spoil of each of the great con- 
querors who successively achieved empire. It was made a 
province, in turn, of Assyria, Babylonia, Persia, Egypt, 
Greece, and finally Rome. The Phoenicians patiently sub- 
mitted to the oppression of these various masters, and paid 
their tribute at Memphis or Nineveh, as the case might be. 
To them the mere question of liberty, or the amount of 
their taxes, was a small one compared with the opening or 



76 PHCENICIA. [880-146 B.C. 

closing of their great routes of trade. The general avoid- 
ance of war, except as they entered the service of theu' 
foreign masters, must have arisen from self-interest, and not 
from cowardice, since the Phoenician navigator displayed a 
courage shaming that of the mere soldier. 

Carthage,^ the most famous Phoenician colony, was 
founded, according to legend, about 880 b. c, by Dido, who 
came thither with a body of aristocrats fleeing from the 
democratic party of Tyi-e. The location of Carthage was 
African, but its origin and language were Asiatic. The 
poUcy of the warlike daughter proved very unhke that of the 
peaceful mother. The young city, having gained wealth by 
commerce, steadily pushed her conquests among the neigh- 
boring tribes inch by inch, until, by the 7th century b. c, 
she reached the frontier of Numidia. No ancient people 
rivaled her in ability to found colonies. These were aU 
kept subject to the parent city, and their tribute enriched 
her treasury. Of the history of Carthage we know little, 
and still less of her laws, customs, and life. No Punic 
orator, philosopher, historian, or poet has left behind any 
fragment to teU of the thoughts that stirred or the events 
that formed this wonderful people. Had it not been for the 
desolating wars that accompanied her fall, we should hardly 
know that such a city and such a nation ever existed. 



1 Carthage was built on a peninsula about three miles wide. Across this was 
constructed a triple wall with lofty towers. A single wall defenrtert the city on every 
side next the sea. The streets were lined with massive houses lavishly adorned 
with the riches of the Punic traders. Two long piers leached out into the sea, 
forming a double harbor,- the outer for mercliant ships, and the inner for the navy. 
In the center of the inner harbor was a lofty island crowned with the admiral's 
palace. Around this island and the entire circumference of the inner liarbor ex- 
tended a marble colonnade of Ionic pillars two stories high ; the lower story foiming 
the front of the curved galleries for the protection of the ships ; and the upper, of 
the rooms for workshops, storehouses, etc. The limits of tlie city were twenty-three 
miles, and it was probably more populous than Rome, Its navy was the largest 
in the world, and in the seaflght with Regulus comprised 350 vessels, carrying 
150,000 men. 



THE CIVILIZATION. 77 



THE CIVILIZATION. 

Civilization. — "Assyria and Egypt were the birthplaces of ma- 
terial civilization, and the Phoenicians were its missionaries." The 
depots of the Phoenician merchants were centers whence germs 
of culture were scattered broadcast. To Europe and Africa these 
traders brought the arts and refinements of the older and more 
advanced East. 

Literature.— Bwi the Phoenicians were more than mere carriers. 
To them we are said to owe the alphabet,^ which came to us, with 
some modifications, through the Greeks and Romans. Unfortu- 
nately no remains of Phoenician literature survive. Treatises on 
agriculture and the useful arts are said to have been numerous ; 
Debir, a Canaanite (probably Phoenician) town of Palestine, was 
termed the " book-city." 

Arts and Inventions. — The Phoenicians were the first to notice the 
connection of the moon with the tides, and apply astronomy prac- 
tically to navigation. They carried on vast mining operations, and 
were marvelous workers in ivory, pottery, and the metals, so that 
their bronzes and painted vases became the models of early Gre- 
cian art. The prize assigned by Achilles for the foot-race at the 
funeral of Patrocles (Iliad, XXIII., 471) was — 

'A bowl of solid silver, deftly wrought, 
That held six measures, and in beauty far 
Surpassed whatever else the world could boast ; 
Since men of Sidon skilled in glyptic art 
Had made it, and Phoenician mariners 
Had brought it with them over the dark sea." 2 

1 According to general belief, the Phoenicians selected from the Egyptian hieratic 
twenty-two letters, making each represent a definite articulation. Twelve of these 
we retain with nearly their Phoenician value. But the age and origin of the alphabet 
are still under discussion. Mr. Petrie says that the inscribed potsherds found by him 
(1890) in Egypt "point to the independent existence of the Phoenician and perhaps 
the Greek alphabet at least 2000 b. c. ;" while Pi-of. Sayce, speaking of recent dis- 
coveries (1890) in Arabia, remarks, " Instead of seeking in Phoenicia the primitive home 
of our alphabet, we may have to look for it in Arabia." 

2 Until recently no specimen of pure Phoenician art was known to exist. Luigi 
Palma di Cesnola, former Consul to the Island of Cyprus, in his excavations on that 
island, uncovered tlie sites of seventeen cities, and opened many thousand tombs. 
Here he found countless Egyptian, Assyrian, Babylonian, Greek, and Phoenician 
treasures, dating from before the time of Thothmes III. (p. 17), whose official seal he 
exhumed. Tlie Phoenician tombs were several feet below the Grecian ; one city hav- 
ing perished and another sprung up, " which, in turn, buried its dead, unconscious of 
the older sepulcher below. Time had left no human remains except a few skulls, to 
some of which still adhered the gold leaf placed by the Phoenicians over the mouth of 
their de^d." 



78 



PHCENICIA. 



Sidon was noted for its glass- working, in whicTi the blow-pipe, 
lathe, and graver were used. The costly purple dye of Tyre, ob- 
tained in minute drops from shell-fish, was famous, the rarest and 
most beautiful shade being worn only by kings. The Phoenicians 
were celebrated for their perfumes, and had a reputation for 
nicety of execution in all ornamental arts. When Solomon was 
about to build the great Jewish Temple, King Hiram sent, at his 
request, " a cunning man of Tyre, skillful to work in gold, in silver, 




SIDON. 



in brass, in iron, in stone, and in timber ; in purple, in blue, in 
crimson, and in fine Unen ; also to grave any manner of graving, 
and to find out every device which shall be put to him." 

Their Beligion resembled that of the Chaldeans and Assyrians, 
but was more cruel. Baal and Moloch were great gods connected 
with the sun. They were worshiped in groves on high places, 
amid the wild cries and self -mutilations of their votaries. Before 
and after a battle (if victorious) large numbers of human beings 



THE CIVILIZATION. 



79 



were sacrificed. Melcarth, the special god of Tyre, united the 
attributes of Baal and Moloch. He was a Hercules who pulled back 
the sun to the earth at the time of the solstices, moderated all 
extreme weather, and counteracted the evil signs of the zodiac ; his 
symbol was that of the Persian Ormazd, — a never-ceasing flame 
(p. 98). Astarte, or Ashtaroth, goddess of fire and chief divinity of 
Sidon, became the wife of Melcarth ; she symbolized the moon. 

Children were the favorite offerings to Moloch. At Jerusalem (2 Kings xxiii. 10) 
the hollow metal image of the Tyrian god was heated hy a fire beneath it, the 
priest placed the child in the idol's glowing hands, and drums were beaten to drown 
the little sufferer's cries. So common were such sacrifices, that one historian says the 
Phoenicians offered some relative on the occasion of any great calamity ; and when 
the Carthaginians were besieged by Agathocles, tyrant of Sicily, they devoted two 
hundred of their noblest children in a public sacrifice. Even in Roman Carthage 
these horrible sights were revived, and infants were publicly offered till Tiberius, 
to put a stop to the revolting practice, crucified the priests on the same trees beneath 
whose shade they had performed these cruel rites. 



READING REFERENCES. 

The General Ancient Histories named on pp. 44 and 72.— Chevalier and Lenor- 
mant's Manual of Oriental History.— Capt. Mago's Adventures, a Phoenician Ex- 
pedition 1000 M.c— Arnold's History of Borne, Vol. II., pp. 455-467 {Carthaginian 
Institutions).— Mommsen's History of Borne, Vol. II., p. 261 (Carthage).— Bawlinson's 
Phoenicia; and Church's Carthage (Story of the Nations Series).— Ferrot and 
Chipiez's History of Art in Phoenicia 



CHRONOLOGY. 

B.C. 

Sldon founded, about 1550 

Rise of Tyre, about 1050 

Carthage founded, about 880 

Phoenicia conquered by Assyria, about 850 

Tyre captured by Nebuchadnezzar 585 

Tyre captured by Alexander 332 




A FH(£NICIAN GALLBY. 



JUDEA. 



The Hebrews were Semites, and related to the Assyrians 
and the Phoenicians. Their history opens, in the 20th cen- 
tury B. c, with the coming of Abram from Chaldea into 
Canaan. There he and his descendants lived, simple shep- 
herds, like the Arabs of to-day, dwelling in tents among 
their flocks and herds. By a singular fortune, Joseph, 
his great-grandson, became vizier of A-pe-pi II., one of the 
shepherd kings of Egypt (p. 17). Being naturally desu'ous 
of surrounding himself by foreigners who would support 
him against a revolt of the people, that monarch invited 
the Hebrews to settle in Egypt. Here they greatly pros- 
pered. But in time the native kings, who " knew not Joseph," 
were restored. During the XIX"' dynasty, Rameses II. 
greatly oppressed them with hard service on his public works 
(p. 18). During the next reign (Mineptah's) Moses, one of 
the profoundest statesmen of history, who was versed in aU 
the learning of the Egyptian court, — then the center of 
civilization, — rescued his people from their bondage.^ 

Geographical Questions.— Bound Palestine. Locate the Dead Sea ; the Sea of 
Galilee; the Kingdom of Judah; the Kingdom of Israel. Describe the River 
Jordan. Where was Jerusalem? Samaria? Jericho? Damascus? Palmyra (Tad- 
mor)? Joppa? Why, in going from Galilee to Jerusalem, did Jesus of Nazareth 
" needs pass through Samaria " ? Name the five cities of the Philistines. Ans. Ash- 
dod, Gaza, Ascalon, Gath, Ekron. 

1 The wonderful events by which this was accomplished are familiar to every 
Bible student. The design is here to give only the political history, omitting that 




J.WELLSj DEL, 



RgSSELU & STRUTHERSjENa'S N-V. 



b22 JUDEA. [1491b. C. 

The Exodus (about 1300 b. c.).1— For forty years Moses 
led the Jews through the wilderness until the 3,000,000 of 
slaves became assimilated into a nation of freemen, were 
won from Egyptian idolatries to the pure worship of the 
one God of their fathers, were trained to war, and made 
acquainted with the religious rites and the priestly govern- 
ment which were henceforth to distinguish them as a people. 

The Conquest of Palestine was accomplished by 
Joshua,^ successor to Moses, in six years of fierce fighting, 
during which thirty-one Canaanite cities were destroyed, 
and the country was allotted to the tribes. 

The Judges. — Unfortunately, Joshua at his death did 
not appoint a new leader; and for want of a head, the 
tribes fell apart. The old spirit of enthusiasm, national- 
ity, and religious fervor waned. Idolatry crept in. For a 
while the conquered Cana,anites made easy prey of the dis- 
united tribes. From time to time there arose heroic men who 
aroused their patriotism, inspired a new zeal for the Mosaic 
law, and induced them to shake off the yoke of servitude. 
These were the days of the Judges — Othniel, Ehud, Gideon, 
Samson, the prophetess Deborah, and the prophet Samuel. 

Kingdom of Israel. — During the last days of the 
Judges, while the Jews and the Canaanites were at war, 
a new power grew up on their borders. The Philistines 

providential oversight more often avowed in the case of the Jews, but not more real 
than in the life of every nation and individual. It is noticeable that Mineptah, 
the Pharaoh who, according to a common belief not supported by the Bible record, 
perished in the Bed Sea, lived many years after that disaster, and died in his bed. 
(See 1 Kings vi. 1.) 

1 This is the date now generally accepted by Egyptologists. Usher, whose chro- 
nology is still preferred by some Bible students, says 1491 b. c. (See i Kings vi. 1.) 

2 Joshua's plan of crossing the Jordan, capturing Jericho, taking the heights be- 
yond by a night-march, and delivering the crushing blow at Bethhoron (Josliua x. 9), 
was a masterpiece of strategy, and ranks him among the great generals of the world. 
His first movement placed him in the center of the country, where he could prevent 
his enemies from massing against him, and, turning in any direction, cut them up 
in detail. 



1095-975 B. c] 



JUDEA. 



83 



formed a strong confederation of five cities along the coast 
sonth of Phoenicia, and threatened the conquest of Canaan. 
In order to make head against them, the people demanded a 
king. Accordingly, three monarchs were given them in 
succession, — 8md^ David, and Momon. Each reigned forty 
years. The first was merely a general, who obeyed the 
orders of God as revealed through the prophet Samuel. 
The second was a warrior king. He enlarged the boundaries 
of Palestine, fixed the capital at Jerusalem, organized an 




TOMBS OF THE JUDGES. 



army, and enforced the worship of Jehovah as the national 
religion. The third was a magnificent oriental monarch. 
His empire reached to the Euphrates, and the splendor of 
his court rivaled that of Egypt and Assyria. He married 
an Egyptian princess, built the temple on Mount jVIoriah 
in Jerusalem, erected splendid palaces, and sent expeditions 
to India and Arabia. This was the golden age of Judea, 
and Jerusalem overflowed with wealth. 



84 JUDEA. [975 b. C, 

The Two Kingdoms. — Luxury, however, brought ener- 
vation, commerce introduced idolatry, extravagance led to 
oppressive taxation. The people, on Solomon's death, de- 
manded of his son a redress of their grievances. This being 
haughtily refused, a revolt ensued. The empire was rent into 
the two petty kingdoms of Israel and Judah, — ^the former 
containing ten tribes ; the latter, two. 

Israel (975 to 722 = 253 years) was idolatrous from the 
start. It was a continued scene of turmoil and wrong. Its 
nineteen kings belonged to nine different families, and eight 
met a violent death. Finally the Assyrians captured Sa- 
maria, the capital, and sent the people prisoners into Media. 
They vanished from history, and are known as the " Lost 
Tribes." The few remaining Israelites combined with the 
foreign settlers to form the Samaritans. With this mongrel 
people pure Hebrews had ''no dealings" (John iv. 9). 

Judah (975 to 586 == 389 years) retained the national 
religion. Its twenty kings, save one usurper, were all of 
the house of David in regular descent. But it lay in the 
pathway of the mighty armies of Egypt and Assyria. Thrice 
its enemies held Jerusalem. At last Nebuchadnezzar de- 
stroyed the city, and carried many of the principal inhabit- 
ants to Babylon. 

The Captivity lasted about seventy years. The Jews 
prospered in their adopted country, and many, like Daniel, 
rose to high favor. 

The Restoration. — Cyrus, after the capture of Babylon 
(p. 51), was friendly to the Jews,^ and allowed those who 
chose to return to Judea and rebuild their temple. They 
were greatly changed by their bondage, and henceforth were 
faithful to their religion. While they had lost their native 

1 This was owing to (1) similarity in their religions; (2) the foretelling of the 
victories of Cyrus by the Jewish prophets; and (3) the influence of Daniel. Bead 
Daniel, Nehemiah, and Ezra. 



536 B. c] 



THE CIVILIZATION. 



85 



language, they had acquired a love for commerce, and many 
afterward went to foreign countries and engaged in trade, 
for which they are still noted. 

Their Later History was full of vicissitude. They 
became a part of Alexander's World Empire (p. 151). When 
that crumbled, Palestine fell to the 
Ptolemies of Egypt (p. 154). In the 
1st century b. c, Judea was absorbed 
in the universal dominion of Rome. 
The Jews, however, frequently re- 
belled, until finally, after a siege of untold horror, Titus 
captured Jerusalem and razed it to the ground. The Jew- 
ish nation perished in its ruins. 




OKIENTAL SANDAL. 



THE CIVILIZATION. 

Civilization. — The Hebrews were an agricultural people. The 
Mosaic law discouraged trade and intercourse with foreign na- 
tions. The priests, who received a share of the crops, naturally 
favoredthe cultivation of the soil. There 
was no art or science developed. When 
the Temple was to be built, Solomon 
obtained not only skilled laborers from 
the Phoenicians (p. 78), but also sailors 
for his fleet. Yet this people, occupy- 
ing a Httle territory 150 miles long and 
50 broad, has, like no other, influenced 
the world's history. Its sacred books 
constitute the Bible; its religion has 
molded the faith of the most progres- 
sive and civilized nations; while from 
its royal family descended Jesus of Naz- 
areth, the grandest factor in aU history. 

The Hebrew Cormnonwealth was the first republic of which we have 
definite knowledge. The foundation was the house : thence the 
ascent was through the family or collection of houses, and the tribe 
or collection of families, to the nation. There were twelve heads of 
tribes, or princes, and a senate of seventy elders, but the source of 




ANCIENT JEWISH BOOK. 



86 



JUDEA. 




power was the popular assembly known as tlie " Congregation of 
Israel," in which every Hebrew proper had a voice. This, like the 
centui'ion assembly of Rome (p. 215), formed the Jewish army. 
The Mosaic Laws were mild, far beyond the spirit of the age. The 

cities of refuge modified the rigors 
of the custom of personal retaha- 
tion, and gave to all the benefits of 
an impartial trial. The slave was 
protected against excessive punish- 
ment, and if of Hebrew birth was 
set free with his children at the 
Jubilee year. Land could not be 
sold for more than fifty years, and 
the debtor could always expect on 
the Jubilee to go back to the home 
of his fathers. The stranger secured 
hospitality and kindness. Usury 
was prohibited. For the benefit 
of the poor, fruit was left on the 
tree, and grain in the field, the law 
forbidding the harvest-land or vine- 
yard to be gleaned. Cruelty to animals was punished, and even 
the mother-bird with her young could not be taken. 

Learning was held in high esteem. All Hebrews received what 
we should call a '^ common-school education." With this, the 
Levites, the hereditary teachers, blended instruction in the sacred 

history, the precepts of 
religion, and their duties 
to God and their coun- 
try. Every boy was com- 
pelled to learn a trade. 
Ignorance of some kind 
of handicraft was discred- 
itable, and the greatest 
scholars and statesmen had somie regular occupation. After the 
captivity, education seems to have been made compulsory. 

The Hittites, mentioned in the Old Testament, inhabited the fer- 
tile valleys of the Orontes, and spread throughout southern Sjrria. 
They were a military and commercial nation, and made great ad- 
vances in civihzation and the fine arts. A court poet is mentioned 



HEBREW PRIEST OFFERING INCENSE. 




JEWISH SHEKEL. 



THE CIVILIZATION. 



87 



on the Egyptian monuments as having been among the retinue of a 
Hittite king, and the early art discovered in Cyprus by Di Cesnola 
is supposed to be largely derived from this people,who long resisted 
both the Assyrians and the Egyptians. The Egyptians called them 
the Kheta, and the victory of 
Rameses II. over the " vile chief 
of Kheta" is celebrated in the 
poem of Pentaur (p. 25). Some 

famous sculptured figures along ancient key. 

the roads near Ephesus and from 

Smyrna to Sardis, attributed by Herodotus to Rameses II., prove 
now to be Hittite monuments. The language and various memo- 
rials of this once- powerful people are being eagerly investigated 




JEKUSALEiM IN EAKLY TIMES. 

by archaeologists, who have ah*eady discovered the site of their 
commercial capital, Carchemish, in a huge mound on the lower 
Euphrates. In this mound — a mass of earth, fragments of ma- 
sonry and debris, surrounded by ruined walls and broken towers — 
important remains with inscriptions are now being found. 

CHRONOLOGY. 

B. C. 

Abrara migrated to Canaan, about 200O 

The Exodus, about 1300 

Monarchy established 1095 

Reign of Solomon 1015-975 

Division of the Kingdom 975 

Sargon took Samaria 722 

Nebuchadnezzar destroyed Jerusalem 588 

Titus took Jerusalem • A. D. 70 



MEDIA AND PERSIA. 



1. THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 

The Medes and Persians, two Aryan nations, were 
early conquered by the Assyrians. The Medes were the first 
to assert their independence. Under Cyax'ares they de- 
stroyed Nineveh (606 B. c.) and divided Ass3n:*ia between 
themselves and the Babylonians, who had aided them in 
this conquest (p. 47). Asty'ages, successor of Cyaxares, had 
been acknowledged superior by the Persian king Cambyses, 
whose son, Cyprus, became a hostage at the Median court. 
But the Medes were better fighters than organizers, and, 
besides, were soon enfeebled by the luxury that follows 
conquest. 

Cyrus ^ was bold, athletic, and ambitious, and soon came 

OeograpMcal Questions.— Bonrifi Persia ; Media. Locate Persepolis; Susa; Pasar- 
gadae. Name the countries of Asia Minor. Wliere was Lydia? Sardis? The river 
Halys? What was the extent of the Persian Empire at the time of Alexander 
the Great 1 

1 According to one of many legends, Cyrus was the grandson, on his mother's side, 
of King Astyages. His future greatness, and through him that of Media's rival, 
Persia, were revealed to Astyages in a dream. Harpagus, who was ordered to kill 
the cliild, gave liim to a herdsman to expose on a mountain (compare Greek and 
Roman customs, pp. 178, 286 ; and Romulus, p. 205). The herdsman, in pity, saved the 
child as his own. A boyish quarrel sent Cyrus before the Median king, who, struck 
by his noble bearing, sent for Harpagus, and, finally learning the truth, quietly 
directed him to send his son to be a companion for the young i)riuce, and himself to 
attend a banquet at the palace. Cyrus was kept at court; but Harpagus, at the royal 
feast which he was directed to attend, was served with the roasted flesh of his own 
son. In time Harpagus roused Cyrus to revolt, betrayed the Median army to the 
young prince, and became his most devoted general. 



558 B. c] 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 



89 



to despise the now effeminate Medes. Arousing his war- 
like countrymen to revolt, he not only achieved their in- 
dependence, but conquered 
Media and established the 
Medo-Persian, the second 
great empire of western 
Asia, His reign was a suc- 
cession of wars and con- 
quests. He defeated Croesus, 
King of Lydia/ thus adding 
to his dominions all Asia 
Minor west of the Halys. He 
captured Babylon (p. 51) and 
overthrew the Assyrian Em- 
pire. With the fall of Baby- 
lon the fabric of Semitic 
grandeur was shattered, and 
Aryan Persia took the lead 
in all western Asia. When 
Cyrus died, the Medo-Persian 
kingdom reached from the 
borders of Macedonia to the 
banks of the Indus. The ex- 
tensive conquests and noble character of this king won for 
him the title of Cyrus the Great. 

1 Lydia was an exceedingly rich country. Her mountains abounded in precious 
ores ; and tlie sands of the river Pactolus, which coursed her capital, Sardis, were 
heavj^ with electrum,— a mixture of gold and silver. Of this electruin, the first known 
coins were made in the 8th century B. c. Croesus was so rich that his name has be- 
come proverbial. He was now doomed to die. Legend relates that, as he watched 
tlie flames surmounting liis funeral pile, he exclaimed " Solon ! Solon ! " that in response 
to the queries of Cyrus he answered that the great Athenian statesman (p. 122) had 
once visited him, and had made light of his wonderful riclies, saying, "No man can 
be judged happy till the manner of his death is known; " and tliat Cyrus, moved by 
the incident, thereupon released him, and became his faithful friend. Chronological 
difficulties in regard to Croesus and Solon have discredited this legend, so charmingly 
told by Herodotus. 




A BAS-RELIEF OF CYRUS. 



90 



MEDIA AND PERSIA. 



[529-522 B. C. 



Cambyses (529 b. c), his son, succeeded to the throne. 
He conquered Egypt (p. 19) in a single battle, using, it 

is said, the stratagem 
of placing before his 
army cats, dogs, and 
other animals sacred to 
the Egyptians. After 
this victory he invaded 
Ethiopia, but his army 




CRCESUS ON THE FUNERAL PYKE (FKOM AN ANCIENT VASE). 

nearly perished in the burning sands of the desert, and he 
returned, disgraced, to Memphis. On his journey back to 
Persia he died (522 b. c.) in Syria of a wound from his own 
sword.i The Persians called the gracious Cyrus '' Father ; " 
the reckless Cambyses was branded as " Despot." 



1 He had just learnecl of the assumption of the " False Smerclis " (p, 91). Hastily- 
mounting his horse, his sword fell from its sheath, and, " killing himself, he died," says 
the Behistun Inscription. Differing authorities interpret this as a suicide or an 
accident. 



521-486 B.C.] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 91 

Darius I. (521 b. c.) ^ organized the vast kingdom whicli 
Cyrus had conquered. There were twenty-three provinces, 
all restless and eager to be free. InsuiTections were there- 
fore frequent. Darius divided the empire into twenty great 
'' satrapies," each governed by a satrap appointed by the king. 
The slightest suspicion of treachery was the signal for their 
instant death. To secure prompt communication with dis- 
tant portions of the empire, royal roads were established 
with coui'iers to be relieved by one another at the end of 
each day's journey. Every satrapy paid a regular tribute, 
but retained its native king, laws, and religion.^ The capi- 
tal of the empire was fixed at Susa. 

Darius I. is called the Second Founder of the Persian 
Monarchy. To his ability as an organizer was added the 
ambition of a conqueror. Having by one masterly move 
grasped the riches of India on the east, he essayed the 
conquest of Greece on the west. The story of his defeat 
we shall study in Greece. 

The Later History of Persia presents the usual charac- 
teristics of oriental despotisms. There were scenes of cruelty, 
treachery, and fraud. Brothers murdering brothers, queens 
slaying their rivals, eunuchs bartering the throne and 
assassinating the sovereign, were merely ordinary events. 
At last the empire itself crumbled before the triumphant 
advance of Alexander. 



1 During the absence of Cambyses in Egypt, the Magi made one Gomates king, 
representing him to be Smerdis, the son of Cyrus. Cambyses, liowever, had secretly 
murdered this brother before his departure from Persia. Darius, conspiring with six 
other nobles, slew the " False Smerdis." The seven noblemen agreed to ride out at 
sunrise of the following day, and that he whose horse tirst neighed should become 
king. Darius secured the prize, Herodotus says, by a trick of his groom in placing 
a horse well known to his master's horse near where they were to pass. 

2 The satraps rivaled the king himself in the magnificence of tlieir courts. Each 
had several palaces with ideasure gardens, or "paradises," as they called them, 
attached. The income of the satrap of Babylon is said to have been four bushels of 
silver coin per day. 



92 MEDIA AND PERSIA. 

2. THE CIVILIZATION. 

Society. — The King, as in Assyria and Babylonia, held at Ms 
disposal the lives, liberties, and property of his people. He was 
bound by the national customs as closely as his meanest subject, but 
otherwise his will was absolute. His command, once given, could 
not be revoked even by himself: hence arose the phrase, "Un- 
changeable as the laws of the Medes and Persians." His every 
caprice was accepted without question. If he chose, in pure wan- 
tonness, to shoot an innocent boy before the eyes of his father, the 
parent, so far from expressing horror at the crime, would praise 
his skillful archery ) and offenders, bastinadoed by royal order, 
declared themselves delighted that his majesty had condescended 
to notice them even with his displeasure. The king was the state. 
If he fell in battle, all was lostj if he were saved, it outweighed 
every calamity. 

The Seven Princes (Esther i.l4; Ezra vii. 14) were grandees next 
to the king. One was of the royal family; the others were chiefs 
of the six great houses from which the king was legally bound to 
choose his legitimate wives. No one except the Seven Princes 
could approach the royal person unless introduced by a court 
usher. They sat beside the king at public festivals, entered his 
apartment at their pleasure, and gave him advice on public and 
private matters. 

The Court was principally composed of Magi (p. 97), who judged 
all moral and civil offenses. 

The People seem to have been divided into two general classes : 
those who lived in towns and cities and who generally cultivated 
the soil, and the roving or pastoral tribes. Social grades were 
strongly marked, and court etiquette was aped among all classes, 
special modes of salutation being prescribed for a man's superior, 
his equal, and his inferior. Trade and commerce were held in con- 
tempt, and the rich boasted that they neither bought nor sold. 

Writing. — Cuneiform Letters. — The Persian characters were 
formed much more simply than the Assyrian. They were, so far 
as now known, less than forty in number, and were written from 
left to right. For public documents the rock and chisel were used ; 
for private, prepared skin and the pen. Clay tablets seem never to 
have been employed, and papyrus brought from Egypt was too 
costly. As the cuneiform letters are not adapted to writing on 
parchment, it is probable that some cursive characters were also in 



THE CIVILIZATION. 93 

use. The Persian writing which has survived is almost entirely 
on stone, either upon the mountain side or on buildings, tablets, 
vases, and signet cyhnders. 

Science and Literature. — To science the Persians contributed 
absolutely nothing. They had fancy, imagination, and a relish for 
poetry and art, but they were too averse to study to produce any- 
thing which required patient and laborious research. In this 
respect they furnish a striking contrast to the Babylonians. 

The Avesta, or Sacred Text, written in Zend, the ancient idiom 
of Bactria, is all that remains to us of their literature. It is com- 
posed of eight distinct parts or books, compiled from various older 
works which have been lost, and purports to be a revelation made 
by Ormazd (p. 98) to Zoroaster, ^ the founder of the Persian religion. 
The principal books are the Vendidad and the Yagna : the former 
contains a moral and ceremonial code somewhat corresponding to 
the Hebrew Pentateuch; the latter consists of prayers, hymns, 
etc., for use during sacrifice. The contents of the Zend-Avesta date 
from various ages, and portions were probably handed down by oral 
tradition for hundreds of years before being committed to writing. 

FROM THE Zend-Avesta. 

" Zoroaster asked Ahura Mazda: ' Ahura Mazda, holiest spirit, creator of all exist- 
ent worlds, the trutliloviug! Wliat was, O Ahura Mazda, the word existing before 
the heaven, before the water, before the eartli, before the cow, before the tree, before 
the lire, the son of Aliura Mazda, before man the truthful, before the Devas and car- 
nivorous beasts, before the whole existing universe, before every good thing created 
by Ahura Mazda and springing from truth ?' 

" Then answered Ahura Mazda : ' It was the All of the Creative Word, most holy 
Zoroaster. I will teach it thee. Existing before the heaven, before the water, before 
the earth,' etc. (as before). 

"'Such is the All of the Creative Word, most holy Zoroaster, that even when 
neither pronounced, nor recited, it is worth one hundred other proceeding prayers, 

1 Zoroaster was a reformer who lived in Bactria, perhaps as early as 1500 B. c. 
Little is known of his actual history. The legends ascribe to him a seclusion of 
twenty years in a mountain cave, where he received his doctrines direct from 
Ormazd. His tenets, though overlaid by superstition, were remarkably pure and 
noble, and of all tlie ancient creeds approach the nearest to tlie inspired Hebrew 
faith. Their common hatred of idolatry formed a bond of S3'^mpathy between the 
early Persians and the Jews, Ormazd and Jehovah being recognized as the same 
Lord God (Isa. xliv. 28; Ezra i. 2, 3). At the time of the Persian conquest by Alex- 
ander, the Zoroastrian books were said to number twenty-one volumes. Duiing 
the five hundred years of foreign rule they were scattered and neglected. Under the 
Sassanian kings (226-651 a. u.) the remaining fragments were carefully collected, and 
translated, with explanatory notes, into the literary language of the day. This trans- 
lation was called Avesta-u-Zend (text and comments). By some mistake the word 
"Zend" was applied to the original language of the text, and is now generally used 
in that sense : hence " Zend-Avesta.'* 



94 MEDIA AND PERSIA. 

neither pronounced, nor recited, nor chanted. And he, most holy Zoroaster, who in 
this existing world remembers the All of the Creative Word, utters it when remem- 
bered, chants it when uttered, celebrates when chanted, his soul will I thrice lead 
across the bridge to a better world, a better existence, better truth, better days. 
I prououuced tliis speech containing the Word, and it accomplished the creation of 
Heaven, before the creation of the water, of the earth, of the tree, of the four-footed 
beast, before the birth of the truthful, two-legged man.' " 

A Hymn.—" We worship Ahura Mazda, the pure, the master of purity. 

" We praise all good thoughts, all good words, all good deeds which are or shall 
be ; and we likewise keep clean and pure all that is good. 

"O Ahura Mazda, thou true, happy being! We strive to think, to speak, and to 
do only such actions as may be best fitted to promote the two lives [i. e., the life of 
the body and the life of the soul]. 

'• We beseech the spirit of eaith for the sake of these our best works [i. e., agricul- 
ture] to grant us beautiful and fertile fields, to the believer as well as to the unbe- 
liever, to him who has riches as well as to him who has no possessions." 

Education. — '' To ride, to draw the bow, and to speak the truth," 
were the great ends of Persian education. When a boy was five 
years old, his training began. He was made to rise before dawn, 
to practice his exercises in running, slinging stones, and the use 
of the bow and javehn. He made long marches, exposed to all 
weathers, and sleeping in the open air. That he might learn to 
endure hunger, he was sometimes given but one meal in two days. 
When he was seven years old, he was taught to ride and hunt, in- 
cluding the ability to jump on and off his horse, to shoot the bow, 
and to use the javelin, all with his steed at full gallop. At the age 
of fifteen he became a soldier. Books and reading seem to have 
formed no part of an ordinary Persian education. The king him- 
self was no exception. His scribes learned his wishes, and then 
wrote his letters, edicts, etc., affixing the royal seal without calling 
upon him even to sign his name.^ 

Monuments and Art. — As the followers of Zoroaster worshiped 
in the open air, we need not look in Persia for temples, but must 
content ourselves with palaces and tombs. The palaces at Persep- 
olis2 were as magnificent as those at Nineveh and Babylon had 
been, though different in style and architecture. Like them they 
stood on a high platform, but the crude or burnt brick of Assyria 

1 " Occasionally, to beguile weary hours, a monarch may have had the ' Book of 
the Chronicles of the Kings of Persia and Media' read before him; but the kings 
themselves never opened a book or studied any branch of science or learning."— 
Bawlinson. 

2 Remains of a large palace have been discovered at Susa, which is supposed to 
be the identical one described in the Book of Esther. On the bases of the pillars it 
is stated that the palace was erected by Darius and Xerxes, but repaired by Artaxerxes 
Memnon, who added the inscriptions. 



THE CIVILIZATION. 



95 



and Babylon gave place to enormous blocks of hewn stone,i 
fastened with iron clamps. The terraced platform, and the broad, 
gently sloping, elaborately sculptured staircases, wide enough to 
allow ten horsemen to ride abreast, were exceedingly grand and 
imposing. The subjects of sculpture were much like those in As- 
syria: the king in combat with mythical monsters, or seated on his 
throne surrounded by his attendants; long processions of royal 
guards, or of captives bringing tribute ; and symbolical combats be- 



I LUl 




PERSIAN SUBJECTS BRINGING TRIBUTE TO THE KING. 

tween bulls and lions. Colossal winged and human-headed bulls, 
copied from Assyria, guarded the palace portals. For effect, the 
Persians depended upon elegance of form, richness of material, 
and splendor of coloring, rather than upon immense size, as did 
the Egyptians and Chaldeans. The Great Hall of Xerxes, how- 
ever, was larger than the Great Hall of Karnak, and in propor- 
tion and design far surpassed anything in Assyria. What enam- 
eled brick was to Babylon, and alabaster sculpture to Assyria, the 
portico and pillar were to Persia. Forests of graceful columns, over 
sixty feet high, with richly carved bases and capitals, rose in hall 
and colonnade, between which were magnificent hangings, white, 

X An idea borrowed from the conquered Egyptians. 



96 



MEDIA AND PERSIA. 




TOMB OF CYRUS AT PASARGAD^. 



green, and violet, " fastened with cords of fine linen and purple to 
silver rings and pillars of marble" (Esther i. 6). Pavements "of 
red, blue, white, and black marble," with carpets from Sardis spread 
for the king to walk upon; walls covered with plates of gold and 
silver ; the golden throne of the king,under an embroidered canopy, 
supported by piUars of gold inlaid with precious stones j a golden 
palm-tree ; gold and silver couches; and over the royal bed a golden 
vine, each grape being a precious stone of enormous value, — are 
recorded as appurtenances to the royal palace. The Persian king, 
like the Egyptian, attended during his lifetime to the building of 
his last resting-place. The most remarkable of the Persian tombs 

is that of Cyrus at Pasargadae, 
_ - ^ ^^^_ which has been called "a house 

upon a pedestal." Upon a pyram- 
idal base made of huge blocks of 
beautiful white marble was erected a 
house of the samematerial,crowned 
with a stone roof. Here, in a small 
chamber entered by a low and nar- 
row door, were deposited in a golden 
coffin the remains of the great con- 
queror. A colonnade of twenty -four pillars, whose broken shafts 
are still seen, seems to have inclosed the sacred spot. With this 
exception, all the royal sepulchers that remain are rock tombs, 
similar in situation to those in Egypt. Unlike those, however, they 
were made conspicuous, as if intended to catch the eye of an ob- 
server glancing up the mountain side. A 
spot difficult of approach having been 
chosen, the recessed chamber was ex- 
cavated in the solid rock, and marked by 
a porticoed and sculptured front, some- 
what in the shape of a Greek cross. The 
sarcophagi, cut in the rock floor of the 
recesses, were covered by stone slabs. 

Persian Architecture is distinguished for 
simplicity and regularity, in most build- 
ings one half being the exact duplicate of 
the other. Although many ideas were bor- 
rowed from the nations we have already 
considered, Persian art, in its best features, such as the grand 
sculptured staircases and the vast groves of tall and slender 




THE GREAT STAIRCASE AT 
PERSEPOLIS. 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 97 

pillars,! with their peculiar ornamentation, was strikingly original. 
The Persian fancy seems to have run toward the grotesque and 
monstrous. When copying nature, the drawing of animals was 
much superior to that of the human form. Statuary was not 
attempted. 

The Practical Arts and Inventions were almost entirely want- 
ing. No enameling, no pottery, no metal castings, no wooden or 
ivory carvings, were made. A few spear and arrow heads, coins, 
and gem cylinders are all the small objects which have been dis- 
covered among the ruins. Persia thus presents a marked contrast 
to the other nations we have been studying. It was, indeed, the 
boast of the Persians that they needed not to toil, since by their 
sMll in arms they could command every foreign production. ^' The 
carpets of Babylon and Sardis, the shawls of Kashmir and India, 
the fine linen of Borsippa and Egypt, the ornamental metal- work 
of Greece, the coverlets of Damascus, the muslins of Babylonia, 
and the multiform manufactures of the Phoenician towns," poured 
continually into Persia as tributes, gifts, or merchandise, and left 
among the native population no ambition for home industries. 



8. THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 

General Character. — The Persian was keen-witted, and ingeni- 
ous, generous, warm-hearted, hospitable, and courageous. He was 
bold and dashing in war ; sparkling, vivacious, and given to repartee 
in social life. Except in the presence of the king, where no sadness 
was allowed, he never cheeked the expression of his emotions, but 
childishly, regardless of all spectators, laughed and shouted when 
pleased, or wept and shrieked when in sorrow. In this he was very 
unlike the Babylonian gentleman, who studied calmness and repose 
of manner. He was self-indulgent and luxurious, but chary of debt. 
The early Persians were remarkable for truthfulness, lying being 
abhorred as the special characteristic of the evil spirit. 

Religion. — That of the Persians was Mazdeism, from Ahura 
Mazda (Ormazd), their great and good god ; it was also called Zoroas- 
trianism, after its founder (p. 93). That of the Medes was Magism, 
so named from the priests, who were of a caste called Magi. 

Mazdeism taught the existence of two great principles, — one good, 
the other evil, — which were in perpetual and eternal conflict. 

1 In Assyria the pillar was almost unknown, while in Egypt it was twice as broad 
in proportion to its height as in Persia. 



98 MEDIA AND PERSIA. 

Ormazd was the "all-perfect, all-powerful, all-wise, all-beautiful, 
all-pure ; sole source of true knowledge, of real happiness ; him who 
hath created us, him who sustains us, the wisest of all intelligences " 
{Yagna). Having created the earth, he placed man thereon to pre- 
serve it. He was represented by the sun, fire, and light. 




SYMBOL OF ORMAZD. 
(Copied by the Persians from that of the Assyrian god Asshur. ) 

Ahrirnan was the author of evil and death, causing sin in man, and 
barrenness upon the earth. Hence the cultivation of the soil was con- 
sidered a religious duty, as promoting the interests of Ormazd and 
defeating the malice of his opposer. Those who yielded to the seduc- 
tions of Ahriman were unable to cross the terrible bridge to which all 
souls were conducted the third night after death ; they fell into the 
gulf below, where they were forced to live in utter darkness and feed 
on poisoned banquets. The good were assisted across the bridge by 
an angel, who led them to golden thrones in the eternal abode of hap- 
piness. Thus this religion, like the Egyptian, contained the doctrine 
of the immortality of the soul and of future reward and punishment. 
Ormazd and Ahriman had each his councilors and emissaries, but they 
were simply genii or spirits, and not independent gods, like the lesser 
deities of the Egyptians and Assyrians. 

Zoroastrian WorsMj) consisted mainly in prayer and praises to 
Ormazd and his court, the recital of Gathas or hymns, and the Homa 
ceremony. In the last, during the recitation of certain prayers, the 
priests extracted the juice of a plant called ^^homa," ^ formally offer- 
ing the liquid to the sacrificial fire, after which a small portion was 
drunk by one of the priests, and the rest by the worshipers. 

Magism taught not only the worship of Ormazd, but also that of 
Ahriman, who, under another name, was the serpent-god of the Tura- 
nians. In Media, Ahriman was the principal object of adoration, 
since a good god, so it was reasoned, would not hurt men, but an evil 

1 A kind of milkweed, sometimes called the "moon-plant." In India it was called 
" soma," and was similarly used. 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 99 

one must be appeased by honor and sacrifice. Sorcery and incanta- 
tions, which were expressly forbidden by Zoroaster, were the out- 
growth of the Median faith. 

The Magi apparently held their office by hereditary succession. In 
time, Magism and Mazdeism became so assimilated that the Magi were 
accepted as the national priests of Persia. As we have seen the Egyp- 
tian religion characterized by animal and sun worship, and the Chal- 
deo-Assyrian by that of the sun, moon, and planets, so we find the 
Persian distinguished by the icorship of the elements. The sun, fire, 
air, earth, and water were all objects of adoration and sacrifice. On 
lofty heights, whence they could be seen from afar, stood the fire- 
altars, crowned by the sacred flame, believed to have been kindled 
from Heaven, and never suffered to expire. It was guarded by the 
Magi, who so jealously kept its purity that to blow upon it with the 
breath was a capital offense. By these holy fires, flickering on lonely 
mountain-tops, the Magi, clad in white robes and with half-concealed 
faces, chanted day after day their weird incantations, and, mysteri- 
ously waving before the awe-stricken spectators a bundle of tamarisk 
twigs (divining-rods), muttered their pretended prophecies. 

Sacrifice was not offered at the altar of the eternal flame, but on fires 
lighted from it, a horse being the favorite victim. A small part of 
the fat having been consumed by the fire, and the soul of the animal 
having been, according to the Magi, accepted by the god, the body was 
cut into joints, boiled and eaten, or sold by the worshipers. Sacri- 
fices to water were offered by the side of lakes, rivers, and fountains, 
care being taken that not a drop of blood should touch the sacred 
element. No refuse was allowed to be cast into a river, nor was it 
even lawful to wash the hands in 'a stream. The worship of these 
elements rendered the disposal of the dead a difficult matter. They 
could not be burnt, for that would pollute fire ; nor thrown' into the 
river, for that would defile water ; nor buried in the ground, for that 
would corrupt earth. The Magi solved the problem by giving their 
own dead to be devoured by beasts of prey. The people revolted from 
this, and incased the lifeless bodies of their friends in a coating of 
wax ; having made this concession to the sacred earth, they ventured 
to bury their dead in its bosom. 

Domestic Life. — The early Persians were noted for their simple 
diet. They ate but one meal a day, and drank only water. With 
their successes their habits changed. They still ate only one meal 
each day, but it began early and lasted till night. Water gave place 
to wine, and each man prided himself on the quantity he could drink. 
Drunkenness at last became a sort of duty. Every serious family 
council ended in a debauch, and once a year, at the feast of Mithras, 
part of the royal display was the intoxication of the king. Love of 



100 



MEDIA AND PERSIA. 




OUDINARY PERSIAN 
COSTUME. 



dress increased, and to the flowered robes and tunics, embroidered 
trousers, tiaras, and shoes of their Median predecessors, the Per- 
sians now added the hitherto unwonted fineries of gloves and stock- 
ings. They wore massive gold collars and bracelets, and studded the 
golden sheaths and handles of their swords and daggers with gems. 
They not only drank wine from gold and silver 
cups, as did their fallen neighbors the Babylonians, 
but they plated and inlaid the tables themselves 
with the precious metals. Even the horses felt the 
growing extravagance and champed bits made of 
gold instead of bronze. Every rich man's house 
was crowded with servants, each confining himself 
to a single duty. Not the least of these were the 
"adorners," who applied cosmetics to their mas- 
ter's face and hands, colored his eyelids, curled his 
hair and beard, and adjusted his wig. The perfume- 
bearer, who was an indispensable valet, took charge 
of the perfumes and scented ointments, a choice 
selection of which was a Persian gentleman's pride. 
Women were kept secluded in their own apartments, called the 
harem or seraglio, and were allowed no communication with the other 
sex.l go rigid was etiquette in this respect, 
that a Persian wife might not even see her own 
father or brother. When she rode, her litter was 
closely curtained, yet even then it was a capital 
ofi'ense for a man simply to pass a royal litter in 
the street. 2 

TJie King^s Household numbered 15,000 persons. 
The titles of some of his servants reveal the des- 
potism and dangers of the times. Such were the 
"Eyes" and "Ears," who were virtually spies 
and detectives; and the "Tasters," who tried 
every dish set before the king, to prove it not 
poisoned. A monarch who held the life of his 
subjects so lightly as did the Persian kings 
might well be on the alert for treachery and 
conspiracy against himself. Hence the court 
ANCIENT PERSIAN customs and etiquette were extremely rigorous. 
SILVER COIN Even to touch the king's carpet in crossing the 




1 Even at the present day it is considered a gross indecorum to ask a Persian 
after the health of his wife. 

2 It is curious to notice that the same custom obtained in Russia a few centuries 
ago. In 1674 two chamberlains were deprived of their offices for having accidentally 
met the carriage of the Tsaritsa Natalia. 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 101 

courts was a grave offense ; and to come into Ms chamber unan- 
nounced, unless the royal scepter was extended in pardon, was punished 
by instant death. Every courtier prostrated himself in the atti- 
tude of worship on entering the royal presence, and kept his hands 
hidden in his sleeve during the entire interview. Even the king was 
not exempt from restrictions of etiquette. He was required to live 
in seclusion ; never to go on foot beyond the palace walls ; and never 
to revoke an order or draw back from a promise, however he might 
desire it. He took his meals alone, excepting occasionally, when he 
might have the queen and one or two of his children for company. 
"When he gave a great banquet, his guests were divided into two 
classes ; the lower were entertained in an outer court, and the higher, 
in a chamber next his own, where he could see them through the cur- 
tain which screened himself. Guests were assigned a certain amount 
of food; the greater the number of dishes, the higher the honor con- 
ferred ; what was left on their plates they were at liberty to take home 
to their families. Sometimes at a "Banquet of Wine," a select num- 
ber were allowed to drink in the royal presence, but not of the same 
wine or on the same terms with the king ; he reclined on a golden- 
footed couch, and sipped the costly wine of Helbon ; they were seated 
on the floor, and were served a cheaper beverage. 

The Persians in War. — Weapons, etc. — The Persian footman 
fought with bow and arrows, a sword and spear, and occasionally with 
a battle-ax and sling. He defended himself with a wicker shield, 
similar to the Assyrian, and almost large enough to cover him. He 
wore a leather tunic and trousers, low boots, and a felt cap; some- 
times he was protected by a coat of mail made of scale-armor, or of 
quilted linen, like the Egyptian corselet. In the heavy cavalry, both 
horse and horsemen wore metal coats of mail, which made their move- 
ments slow and hesitating ; the light cavalry were less bin'dened, and 
were celebrated for quick and dexterous maneuvering. The special 
weapon of the horseman was a javelin, — a short, strong spear, with 
a wooden shaft and an iron point. Sometimes he was armed with a 
long leather thong, which he used with deadly effect as a lasso. The 
war-chariots, which we have seen so popular in Egyptian and Assyrian 
armies, were regarded by the Persians with disfavor. Kings and 
princes, however, rode in them, both on the march and in action, and 
sometimes a chariot force was brought into the field. The wheels of 
the Persian chariot were armed with scythes, but this weapon does not 
seem to have caused the destruction intended, since, as it was drawn 
by from two to four horses, and always contained two or more occu- 
pants, it furnished so large a mark for the missiles of the enemy, that 
a chariot advance was usually cheeked before reaching the opposing 
line of battle. Military engines seem rarely if ever used, and the 



102 



MEDIA AND PERSIA. 



siege-towers and battering-rams, so familiar in Egyptian and Assyrian 
sculptures, are never mentioned in Persian inscriptions. Elephants 
were sometimes employed in battle ; and at Sardis, Cyrus gained his 
victory over Croesus by frightening the Lydian horses with an array 
of camels. 

Organization of the Army. — The Persians trusted for success mainly 
to numbers. The army was commanded personally by the king, or 
some one appointed by him. In the division of men under officers a 
decimal system prevailed, so that, grading upward, there were the cap- 
tains of tens, of hundreds, of thousands, and of tens of thousands. 
Sometimes a million men were brought into service. i 




PERSIAN FOOT-SOLDIEUS. 



On the March. — The Persians, like the Assyrians, avoided fighting 
in winter, and led out their armies in early spring. They marched 
only by day, and, as before the time of Darius there were neither 
roads nor bridges, their immense cavalcade made slow progress. The 
baggage-train, composed of a vast multitude of camels, horses, mules, 



1 The troops were drawn from the entire empire, and were marshaled in the 
field according to nations, each tribe accoutered in its own fashion. Here were seen 
the gilded breastplates and scarlet kilts of the Persians and Medes ; there the woolen 
shirt of the Arab, the leatliern jerkin of the Berber, or the cotton dress of the native 
of Hindustan. Swart savage Ethiops from the Upper Nile, adorned with a war-paint 
of white and red, and scantily clad with the skins of leopards or lions, fought in one 
place with huge clubs, arrows tipped with stone, and spears terminating in the horn 
of an antelope. In another, Scyths, with their loose, spangled trousers and their 
tall pointed caps, dealt death around from their unerring blows; while near them 
Assyrians, helmeted, and wearing corselets of quilted linen, wielded the tough spear 
or the still more formidable iron mace. Rude weapons, like cane bows, unfeathered 
arrows, and stakes hardened at one end in the fire, were seen side by side with keen 
swords and daggers of the best steel, the finished productions of the workshops of 
Phoenicia and Greece. Here the bronze helmet was surmounted with the ears and 
horns of an ox ; tliere it was superseded by a fox-skin, a leathern or wooden skull-cap, 
or a head-dress fashioned out of a horse's scalp. Besides horses and mules, elephants, 
camels, and wild asses diversified the scene, and rendered it still more strange and 
wonderful to the eye of a European.— iJawMnsow. 



SUMMARY. 103 

oxen, etc., dragging heavy carts or bearing great packs, was sent on 
in advance, followed by about half the troops in a long, continuous 
column. Then, after a considerable break, came a picked guard of a 
thousand horse and a thousand foot, preceding the most precious 
treasures of the nation, — its sacred emblems and its king. The former 
consisted of the holy horses and cars, and perhaps the silver altars 
on which flamed the eternal fire. The monarch followed, riding on 
a car drawn by Nisaean steeds. After him came a second guard of a 
thousand foot and a thousand horse ; then ten thousand picked foot — 
probably the famous '^ Immortals ^^ (p. 130) — and ten thousand picked 
horsemen. Another break of nearly a quarter of a mile ensued, and 
then the remainder of the troops completed the array. The wives of 
the chief officers often accompanied the army, and were borne in 
luxurious litters amid a crowd of eunuchs and attendants. On enter- 
ing a hostile land, the baggage-train was sent to the rear, horsemen 
were thrown out in front, and other effective changes made. 

In Battle the troops were massed in deep ranks, the bravest in front. 
Chariots, if used, led the attack, followed by the infantry in the center, 
and the cavalry on the wings. If the line of battle were once broken, 
the army lost heart ; the commander usually set the example of flight, 
and a general stampede ensued. 



4. SUMMARY. 

1. Political History. — In the 7th century B. c. the hardy Medes 
threw off the Assyrian yoke and captured Nineveh. But the court of 
Astyages became as luxurious as that of Asshurbanipal had been, and 
the warlike Persians pushed to the front. Under Cyrus they conquered 
Media, Lydia, Babylonia, and founded an empire reaching from India 
to the confines of Egypt. Cambyses, helped by Phoenicians, subdued 
Egypt, but most of his army perished in the Ethiopia desert. Mean- 
while a Magian usurped the throne in the name of Smerdis, the mur- 
dered brother of Cambyses. Darius unseated the Pseudo-Smerdis, and 
organized the empire which Cyi-us had conquered. He invaded India, 
Scythia, and finally Greece, but his hosts were overthrown on the field 
of Marathon (see p. 126). 

2. Civilization. — Every Persian, even though one of the Seven 
Princes, held his life at the mercy of the king. Truthful and of simple 
tastes ill his early national life, he grew in later days to be luxurious 
and effeminate. Keen-witted and impulsive, having little love for 
books or study, his education was with the bow, on the horse, and in 
the field. In architecture he delighted in broad, sculptured staircases, 
and tall, slender columns. He expressed some original taste and de- 



104 



MEDIA AND PERSIA. 



sign, but his art was largely borrowed from foreign nations, and his 
inventions were few or none. He wrote in cuneiform characters, using 
a pen and prepared skins for epistles and private documents ; his public 
records were chiseled in stone. He had little respect for woman, and 
kept his wife and daughters confined in the harem. He went to war 
with a vast and motley cavalcade, armed by nations, and relied upon 




THK UUINS OF tEUSEPOLIS. 

overwhelming numbers for success. He worshiped the elements, 
and the Magi — ^his priests — guarded a holy flame on mountain heights. 
When he died, his friends incased his body in wax ^nd buried it, or 
exposed it to be destroyed by the vultures and wild beasts. 

READING REFERENCES. 

The General Ancient Histories named on pp. 44 and 72.— Bawlinson's Five Great 
Monarchies.— Vaux's Nineveh and Persepolis.—Fergusson's Palaces of Nineveh and 
Persepolis restored.— Loftus's Chaldea and Susiana.— Hang's Essays on the Sacred 
Language, Writings, and Religion of the Parsees.—Ebers''s Egyptian Princess {p. 44) 
contains a vivid description of the times of Cambyses and the Pseudo-Smerdis.-Raw- 
linson's Translation of Herodotus.— Miiller's Sacred Books of the East ( Vols. TV. and 
v.). —Benjamin's Story of Persia.— Media and Persia in the various Cyclopcedias. 

CHRONOLOGY. 

B.C. 

Cyaxares destroyed Nineveh 606? 

Cyrus subdued the Medes 558 

Cyrus defeated Croesus, and captured Sardis 547? 

Cyrus subdued the far East 553-540 

Cyrus captured Babylon 538 

Cambyses ascended the Tlirone 529 

Cambyses conquered Egypt • 527 

Darius Hystaspes ascended the Throne 521 

Darius invaded Greece 490 



INDIA. 



The Hindoos, like the Persians, were Aryans. In all 
respects, except color, they resemble the Europeans. They 
are thought to have emigrated from Iran (p. 12) earlier than 
1500 B. c. They never materially influenced the steady flow 
of history,^ and are only incidentally mentioned when for- 
eigners went thither for purposes of trade or conquest. The 
first authentic event recorded is that of the invasion of 
Darius (518 b. c), and the next that of Alexander (p. 152). 

THE CIVILIZATION. 

Civilization. — The character of their civilization was early 
stereotyped. By mixing with the dark races of the country, the 
fair-skinned invaders lost the Aryan progressiveness and energy. 
What Alexander found in India meets the traveler there to-day, — 
a teeming, peaceable population; fabulous riches; arts and in- 
dustries passing unchanged from generation to generation; and 
a rehgion whose rigorous rules and ceremonies regulate all the 
details of life. The products of Indian looms were as eagerly 
sought anciently as now ; and the silks, pearls, precious stones, 
spices, gold, and ivory of India have in successive ages enriched 
Phoenicia, the Italian republics, and England. 

Society. — Castes were established by the early Aryans : (1) the 
Brahmans, or priests, who had the right of interpreting the sacred 
books, and possessed a monopoly of knowledge ; (2) the Kshatriyas, 

1 There is little, if anything, in the Indian annals worthy the name of history. 
The Hindoo mind, though acute and intelligent, is struck, not by the reasonableness 
or truth of a statement, but by its grandeur. Thus, in the Brahman mythology we 
hear of R^hu, an exalted being, 76,800 miles high and 19,200 miles across the shoul- 
ders. While the Egyptian engraved on stone the most trivial incident of daily life, 
the Hindoo disregarded current events, and was absorbed in metaphysical subtleties. 



106 INDIA. 

or soldiers; (3) the Vaisya, or traders and farmers; and (4) the 
Sudras, or laborers, who consisted of the conquered people, and 
were slaves. The Fariahs, or outcasts, ranked below all the others, 
and were condemned to perform the most menial duties. Inter- 
marriage between the castes was forbidden, and occupations de- 
scended rigidly from father to son. 

Literature. — The Sanskrit (perfected), the language of the 
conquerors, is preserved among the Hindoos, as is the Latin with 
us, through grammars and dictionaries. Its literature is rich in 
fancy and exalted poetry, and embalms the precious remains of 
that language which was nearest the speech of our Aryan fore- 
fathers. Thousands of Sanskrit works are still in existence. No 
man's life is long enough to read them all. A certain Hindoo 
king is said to have had the contents of his library condensed into 
12,000 volumes ! A portion of the Vedas, the sacred books of 
Brahma, was compiled 1200 b. c. The Rig- Veda contains 1028 
hymns, invoking as gods the sun, moon, and other powers of 
nature. The following extract is a beautiful litany : — 

1. " Let me not yet, O Varuna [the god of water], enter into the house of clay. 
Have mercy. Almighty, have mercy ! 

2. " If I go along trembling, like a cloud driven by wind, have mercy, Almighty, 
have mercy ! 

3. " Through want of strength, thou Strong One, have I gone to the wrong shore. 
Have mercy. Almighty, have mercy! 

4. " Thirst came on the worshiper, in the midst of the waters. Have mercy. 
Almighty, have mercy ! 

5. " Wherever we men, O Varuna, commit an oflfense before the heavenly host; 
wherever we break thy law through thoughtlessness, have mercy, Almighty, have 
mercy ! " 

Religion. — Brahmanism, the Hindoo faith, teaches panfheismj^ 
a system which makes God the soul of the universe, so that *' what- 
ever we taste, or see, or smell, or feel, is God." It also contains 
the doctrine of the transmigration of souls; i, e., that after death 
good spirits will be absorbed into the Supreme Being, but wicked 
ones will be sent back to occupy the bodies of animals to begin 
afresh a round of purification and elevation. The idea of prayer, 
meditation, sacrifice, and penance,^ in order to secure this final 

1 The doctrmeof the Hindoo Trinity, i. e., that God reveals himself in three forms,— 
Brahma the creator, Vishnu the i)reserver, and Siva the destroyer,— is now known 
to be a modern one. It grew out of an attempt to harmonize all the views that were 
hostile to Buddhism. 

2 Travelers tell us that Hindoo fanatics carry this idea of penance to such an 
extent as to keep their hands clinched until the nails grow through the palms, and to 
hold their arms upright until they become paralyzed. 



THE CIVILIZATION. 



107 



absorption which is the highest good, constitutes the key to Brah- 
manism, and explains why in its view the hermit and devotee 
are the truly wise. By 
acts of benevolence and 
sacrifice performed in 
different stages of trans- 
migration, one may ac- 
cumulate a vast stock of 
merit, so as finally to at- 
tain to a godlike intelli- 
gence. Several of these 
divine sages are believed 
to have arisen from time 
to time. 

Buddhism (500 B. c.) 
was an effort to reform 
Brahmanism by incul- 
cating a benevolent and 
humane code of morals. 
It teaches the necessity 
of a pure life, and holds 
that by the practice of 
six transcendent virtues 
— alms, morals, science, 
energy, patience, and 
charity — a person may 
hope to reach Nirvana or 
eternal repose. Buddha, 
the founder of this sys- 
tem, is said to have ^'previously existed in four hundred millions 
of worlds. During these successive transmigrations he was almost 
every sort of fish, fly, animal, and man. He had acquired such a 
sanctity millions of centuries before as to permit him to enter Nir- 
vana, but he preferred to endure the curse of existence in order to 
benefit the race." Buddha is an historic character. His life was 
marvelously pure and beautiful; but his religion was a practi- 
cal atheism, and his teachings led to a belief in annihilation and 
not absorption in Brahma, or God, as the chief end of existence. The 
Buddhists were finally expelled from India. But they took refuge 
in Ceylon ; their missionaries carried their doctrines over a large 
part of the East, and Buddhism now constitutes the rehgion of 




BUDDHIST PKIESTS. 



108 



INDIA. 



over one fourth, of the world's population. There are almost end- 
less modifications of both these faiths, and they abound in senti- 
ments imaginative and subtle beyond conception. Mingled with 
this lofty ideahty is the grossest idolatry, and most grotesque 
images are the general objects of the Hindoo worship. 

The Sacred Writings of the Hindoos contain much that is simple 
and beautiful, yet, like all such heathen literature, they are full of 
silly and repulsive statements. Thus the Institutes of Vishnu declare 
that "cows are auspicious purifiers ; " that " drops of water falling 



r ' 




A BRAHMAN AT PRAYER. 



from the horns of a cow have the power to expiate all sin 5 " and 
that *' scratching the back of a cow destroys all guilt." The Brah- 
mans assert that prayer, even when offered from the most unworthy 
motives, compels the gods to grant one's wishes. The Institutes of 
Gautama (Buddha) forbid the student to recite the text of the Veda 
"if the wind whirls up the dust in the day-time." The Buddhists 
declare that all animals, even the vilest insects, as well as the 
seeds of plants, have souls. 

READING REFERENCES. 



Muller's Saered Boohs of the East, and History of Ancient Sanskrit Literature.— 
Whitney's Oriental and Linguistic Studies. — LenormanVs Manuel, etc., Vol. III.— 
Johnson's Oriental Religions, India.— Taylor' s Student's Manual of the History of 
India.— Bayard Taylor's India, China, and Japan.— Articles on India, etc., in Apple- 
tons', Zell's, and Johnson's Cyclopaedias, and Encyclopcedia Britannica. 



CHINA. 



The Chinese were Turanians (p. 10). Their historical 
records claim to reach far back of all known chronology, 
but these are largely mythical. Good authorities place the 
foundation of the empii-e at about 2800 B. c. Since then 
more than twenty dynasties of kings have held sway. From 
early times the country has been disturbed by incursions 
of the Tartars (Huns or Mongols). The Emperor Che 
Hwang-te, the Chinese national hero, expelled these wild 
barbarians, and to keep them out began (214 B. c.) the Great 
Wall of China along the northern frontier. This wall is fif- 
teen to thirty feet high, wide enough for six horsemen to ride 
abreast upon the top, and extends over mountains and valleys 
a distance of over twelve hundi*ed miles. Che Hwang-te 
died six years before it was finished. 

, In the 13th centuiy the great Asiatic conqueror Genghis 
Khan invaded the empire, and paved the way for the estab- 
lishment of the first Mongol dynasty, which held the king- 
dom for nearly one hundred years. During this period the 
famous traveler Marco Polo (Brief Hist. U. S., p. 19) visited 
China, where he remained seventeen years. On his return 
to Europe he gave a glowing description of the magnificence 
of the Eastern monarch's court. Again, in the 17th century, 
the Tartars obtained the throne, and founded the dynasty 
which now governs the empire. 



110 



CHINA. 



THE CIVILIZATION. 

Civilisation. — The Chinese have always kept themselves isolat- 
ed from the other nations : consequently China has influenced his- 
tory even less than has India. Law and tradition have done for the 
former what a false religion has for the latter. Everything came to 
a stand-still ages ago.^ The dress, the plan of the house, the mode 
of bowing, the minutest detail of life, are regulated by three thou- 



z^:: 








/- <'-►'' 

'•«.. 




THE GREAT WALL OF CHINA. 



sand ceremonial laws of almost immemorial usage. No man pre- 
sumes to introduce any improvement or change. The only hope is to 
become as wise as the forefathers by studying the national classics. 



1 Heroclotus says that in dealing with foreigners the Chinese were wont to deposit 
their wool or silk in a certain place, and then go away. The merchants came up, laid 
beside the goods the sum of money they were willing to pay, and retired. The Chi- 
nese then ventured out again, and, if satisfied, took the money and left the goods; 
if not, they left the money and carried off the goods. There is a marked resemblance 
between this people and the ancient Egyptians. Both have the same stereotyped 
character, the same exceptional mode of writing, the same unwillingness to mingle 
with surrounding nations, the same mode of reckoning time by dynasties, and the 
same enjoyment in the contemplation of death. 



THE CIVILIZATION. 



Ill 



Such is the esteem in which agriculture is held, that once a year 
the emperor exhibits himself in public, holding a plow. The in- 
genuity of the Chinese is proverbial. They anticipated by centu- 
ries many of the most important inventions of modern Europe, 
such as gunpowder, printing, paper, porcelain, and the use of the 
compass. A Chinese chart of the stars represents the heavens 
as seen in that country 2300 b. c. , thus showing how early astron- 
omy was cultivated by this people. 

The Literature is very extensive. 
The writings of Confucius (551-478 
B. c.) are the chief books perused 
in the schools. All appointments 
to the civil service are based on ex- 
aminations, which include the prep- 
aration of essays and poems, and 
the writing of classical selections. 

Three Religions, Buddhism, Tad- 
ism or Rationalism, and Confu- 
cianism, exist. Such is the liberty 
of faith, that a man may beheve 
in them all, while the mass of the 
people will pray in the temples of 
any one indiscriminately. All these 
faiths agree in the worship of one's 
ancestors. Buddhism was introduced 
from India (p. 107), and by its gor- 
geous ritual and its speculative doc- 
trines, powerfully appeals to the 
imagination of its devotees. Tadism traditional likeness of confucrs. 
is a rehgion of the supreme reason 

alone. Confucianism is named from its founder, who taught a 
series of elevated moral precepts, having reference solely to man's 
present, and not his future state. Confucius died eight years 
before the birth of the Greek philosopher Socrates (p. 174). 

Sayings of Confucius.—" He who exercises government by means of his virtue 
may be compared to the noith polar star whicli keeps its place, and all the (other) 
stars turn towards it." 

" What you do not like when done to yourself, do not do to others." 

" I am not concerned that I have no place (office) ; I am concerned how I may fit 
myself for one. I am not concerned that I am not known , I seek to he worthy to be 
known." 

" Slow in words and earnest in action. Act before speaking, and then speak ac- 
cording to your actions." 




112 



CHINA, 



EXTRACT FROM THE CLASSIC OF FILIAL PIETY.—" The Services of love and rev. 
erence to parents when alive, and those of grief aud sorrow to them when dead :— 
these completely discharge the fundamental duty of living men." 

The Chinese call their country the " Middle Kingdom," from a notion that it is 
in the center of the world. Their map of the globe is a parallelogram, of the habit- 
able part of which China occupies nine tenths or more. " I felicitate myself," says a 
Chinese essayist, " that I was born in China, and not beyond the seas in some remote 
part of the earth, where the people, far removed from the converting maxims of the 
ancient kings, and ignorant of the domestic relations, are clothed with tlie leaves of 
plants, eat wood, and live in the holes of the earth." 



READING REFERENCES. 

DooUttle's Social Life of the Chinese.— Loomis's Confucius and the Chinese 
Classics.—Collie's Four Books {a Translation of Chinese Classical Works).— Thornton's 
History of China.— Williams's Middle Kingdom.— Legge's Religions of China.— John- 
son's Oriental Religions ; China.— Articles on China and Confucius in Appletons', 
ZelVs, and Johnson's Cyclopaedias and Encyclopcedia Britannica. 




^ 



CHINESE TEMPLE. 




HELLAS 

OR 

GREECE 

Scale of English Miles 



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GREECE. 



1. THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 

Seat of Civilization Changed.— Thus far we have 

traced the beginnings of civilization among the oldest peoples 
of antiquity. Our study has been confined to the Orient. 
We now turn to Europe. Its history, so far as we know, 
began in Greece. The story of that little peninsula became, 
about the time of the Persian wars (p. 91), the record of 
civilization a.nd progress, to which the history of the East is 
thenceforth but an occasional episode. 

The Difference between Eastern and Western 
Civilization is marked. The former rose to a considerable 
height, but, fettered by despotism, caste, and polygamy, was 
soon checked. The monarchs were absolute, the empires 
vast, and the masses passive. In Greece, on the contrary, 
we find the people astir, every power of the mind in full 
play, and little states aU aglow with patriotic ardor. Assy- 
rian art, Egyptian science, and the Phoenician alphabet were 
absorbed, but only as seeds for a new and better growth. 
Much of the hf e we live to-day, with its political, social, and 

Geographical Questions —^owa^ Greece Name the principal Grecian states; 
the principal Grecian colonies (map, p 11) ; the chief islands in the JEgean Sea. 
Locate the Peloponnesus; Arcadia. Where was Ionia? ^olir? Athens? Sparta? 
Thebes? Argos? Corinth? Delphi? Marathon? Plataea? The pass of Ther 
mopylae? Ilium? The Hellespont? The isle of Rhodes? Mount Parnassus? 
ValeofTempe? Mount Ossa? Mount Pelion? Salamis Island? Syracuse'? Magna 
Graecial Chaeronea? 



114 GREECE. 

intellectual advantages; its music, painting, oratory, and 
sculpture; its thii^st for knowledge, and its free institu- 
tions, — was kindled on the shores of the ^ge'an Sea, was 
transmitted by the Greek to the Roman, by him to the Teu- 
ton, and so handed down to us. 

The Geographical Features of Grreece had much to 
do with fixing the character of its inhabitants. The coast 
was indented, like no other, with bays having bold promon- 
tories reaching far out to sea, and forming excellent harbors. 
Nature thus afforded every inducement to a sea-faring life. 
In striking contrast to the vast alluvial plains of the Nile 
and the Euphrates, the land was cut up by almost impassable 
mountain ranges, isolating each little valley, 'and causing 
it to develop its peculiar life. A great variety of soil and 
climate also tended to produce a versatile people. 

The Early Inhabitants were our Aryan kinsfolk 
(p. 12). The Pelasgians,^ a simple, agricultural people, were 
the first to settle the country. Next the Helle'nes, a warlike 
race, conquered the land. The two blended, and gave rise to 
the Grecian language and civilization, as did in later times 
the Norman and Anglo-Saxon to the English. 

Hellas and Hellenes. — The Greeks did not use the 
name by which we know them, but called their country 
Hellas, and themselves Hellenes. Even the settlements in 
Asia Minor, and in the isles of the ^ge'an and Mediter- 
ranean, were what Freeman happily styles "patches of 
Hellas." All those nations whose speech they could not 
understand they called Barbarians. 

Grecian Unity. — The different Grecian states, though 
always jealous and often fighting, had much in common. 



1 Bemains of the PelasgiaB architecture still survive. They are rude, massive 
stone structures. The ancients considered them the work of the Cyclops,— a fabulous 
race of giants, who had a single eye in the middle of the forehead. 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 115 

All spoke the same language, though there were several 
dialects. They had many common customs, and a com- 
mon inheritance in the poems of Homer (p. 162) and the 
glory of the Hellenic name. There were, moreover, two 
great "holding-points" for all the Greeks One was the 
half-yearly meeting of the Amphictyonic Council,^ and the 
other the national games or festivals (p. 186). All Hellenes 
took part in the latter, and thus the colonies were united to 
the parent state. The Grecian calendar itself was based on 
the quadrennial gathering at Olympia, the First Olympiad 
dating from 776 b. c.^ 

Legendary History. — The early records of Greece are 
mythical. It is not worth the effort to pick out the kernels 
of truth around which these romantic legends grew. They 
chronicle the achievements of the Heroic Age of the poets. 
Then occurred the Argonautic Expedition in search of the 
Golden Fleece, the Twelve Labors of Hercules, the Siege of 
"Troy divine," the Hunt of the Calydonian Boar, and the 
exploits of heroes whose adventures have been familiar to 
each succeeding age, and are to-day studied by the youth of 
every civilized land.^ 



1 In early times twelve tribes in the north agreed to celebrate sacrifices together 
twice a year, — in the spring to Apollo at Delphi, and in the autumn to Ceres at An- 
thela, near Thermopylae. Their deputies were called the Amphictyonic Council 
(council of the neighbors or co religionists), and the meetings, from being at first 
purely religious, became great centers of political influence. The temple at Delphi 
belonged to all the states, and the Delphic Oracle attained celebrity not only among 
the Greeks, but also among foreign nations. 

2 This was twenty -nine years before the era of Nabonassar (p. 46), and half a 
century before the Captivity of the Ten Tribes by Sargon (p 84) 

3 Thus read the legends : (1) Jason, a prince of Thessaly, sailed with a band of 
adventurers in the good ship Argo. The Argonauts went through the Dardanelles, 
past the present site of Constantinople, to the eastern coast of the Euxine Sea Jason 
there planted a colony, took away the famous Golden Fleece, carried oflf tlie beautiful 
princess Medea, and returned to Thessaly in triumph. (2) Hercules was the son of 
Jupiter and Alcmena Juno, Queen of Heaven, sent two seipeuts to strangle him 
in his cradle, but the precocious infant killed them both, and escaped unharmed. 
Afterward his half brother, Eurystheus, imposed upon him twelve difficult under 
takings, aU of which he successfullv accomplished. (2) Soon after the return of the 



116 



Gr Hi £i £1 C £! • 



Primitive Governments. — In legendary times, as we 
learn from the Iliad, each little city or district had its he- 
reditary king, supposed to be descended from the gods. He 




THE DEPARTURE OF ACHILLES (FROM AN ANCIENT VASE). 



was advised by the Council of the Elders and the Assembly, 
the latter being a mass meeting, where all the citizens gath- 

Argoiiautic expedition several of the Grecian wariiora— Meleager, Theseus, and 
others— joined in an iEolian war, which the poets termed the "Hunt of the Calydo- 
nian Boar." ^neus, Icing of Calydon, father of Meleager, having neglected to pay 
homage to Diana, that goddess sent a wild hoar, which was impervious to the spears 
of ordinary huntsmen, to lay waste his country. All the princes of the age assembled 
to hunt him down, and he was at last killed hy the spear of Meleager. (4) The story 
of the Siege of Troy is the subject of Homer's Iliad. Venus had promised Paris, son 
of Priam, King of Troy, that if he would pronounce her the most beautiful of the 
goddesses, he should have for wife the handsomest woman of liis time, Helen, wife 
of Menelaus, King of Sparta. Paris granted the boon, and then going to Sparta 
carried oflf Helen to Troy. Menelaus, smarting under this wrong, appealed to the 

Grecian princes for help. They assembled 
under his brother Agamemnon, King of My- 
cenae. A hundred thousand men sailed away 
in eleven hundred and eighty-six ships across 
the JEge'an, and invested Troy. The siege 
lasted ten years. Hector, "of the beamy 
helm," son of Priam, was tlie bravest leader 
of the Trojans. Achilles, the first of Grecian 
warriors, slew him in single combat, and 
dragged his body at his chariot- wheels in in- 
solent triumph around the walls of the city. 
But the "lion-hearted "Achilles fell in turn 
"for so the Pates had decreed." Troy was finally taken by stratagem. The Greeks 
feigned to retire, leaving behind them as an ottering to Minerva a great wooden horse. 
This was reported to be purposely of such vast bulk, in order to prevent the Trojans 
from taking it into the city, as that would be fatal to the Grecian cause. The deluded 




PROW OF AN EARLY GREEK SHIP. 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 117 

ered about the king and the elders to discuss political^ 
affairs. The power of the kings gradually diminished until 
most of the cities became repubhcs, or commonwealths. 
In some cases the authority was held by a few families. If 
good, it was styled an aristocracy [aristos, best) ; but if bad, 
an oligarchy {oligos, few). In a democracy any citizen could 
hold office and vote in the assembly. At Sparta there were 
always two kings, although in time they lost most of their 
power. 

The Dorian Migration was one of the first clearly 
defined events of Grecian history. After the Trojan war 
the ties which had temporarily held the princes together 
were loosed, and a general shifting of the tribes ensued. 
The Dorians — a brave, hardy race — descended from the 
mountains, and moved south in search of new homes.^ They 
conquered the Achaeans in the Peloponnesus, and occupied 
the chief cities, — Argos, Corinth, and Sparta. This was 
about the 11th century B. c. 

Grecian Colonies. — HeUas was greatly extended in con- 
sequence of these changes. A part of the Ach^ans fled 
northward, dispossessing the lonians, many of whom emi- 
grated to Asia Minor, where they founded the Ionic colonies,^ 
among which were Ephesus (Acts xix. 1 ; xx. 15) and Mile'- 



iiihaWtants fell into the snare, and eagerly dragged the unwieldy monster within their 
walls. That night a body of men concealed in the horse crept out, threw open the 
gates, and admitted tlie Grecians, wlio liad quietly returned. From the terrible mas- 
sacre which ensued, Mne'sm, a famous Trojan chief, escaped with a few followers. 
His subsequent adventures form the theme of Virgil's ^Ene'id. Homer's Odyssey tells 
the wanderings of the crafty Ulysses, king of Ithaca, on his journey home from Troj% 
and the trials of his faithful wife Penelope during his absence. 

1 The word "politics" is derived from the Greek word for city, and meant in its 
original form only the affairs of the city. The Hellenes, unlike most other Aryans 
(except the Italians), from the very first gatliered in cities. 

2 This event is known in Grecian histoiy as "The Return of the Heraclei'dae." 
The Dorians were induced by the descendants of Hercules to support their claim to 
the throne of Argos, whence their ancestor had been driven by the family of Pelops. 

s Some authorities make the Ionic colonies the parents of Greece. 



118 (Greece. 

tus. Similarly, the ^olians had already founded the u^olic 
colonies. Finally the Dorians were tempted to cross the sea 
and establish the Doric colonies, chief of which was Rhodes 
(map, p. 11). In subsequent times of strife many G-reek 
citizens grew discontented, and left their homes to try their 
fortune in new lands. The colonial cities also soon became 
strong enough to plant new settlements. Every opportunity 
to extend their commerce or political influence was eagerly 
seized by these energetic explorers. In the palmy days of 
Greece, the Euxine and the Propontis (Sea of Marmora) 
were fringed with Hellenic towns. The Ionian cities, at the 
time of the Persian conquest (p. 125), " extended ninety miles 
along the coast in an almost uninterrupted line of magnificent 
quays, warehouses, and dwellings.'' On the African shore 
was the rich Cjrrene, the capital of a prosperous state. Sicily, 
with her beautiful city of Syracuse, was like a Grecian island. 
Southern Italy was long called Magna Grgecia (Great Greece). 
The Phoenicians, the seamen and traders of these times, 
almost lost the commerce of the eastern Mediterranean. On 
the western coast the Greeks possessed the flourishing colony 
of Massilia (Marseilles), and, had it not been for the rising 
power of Carthage, would have secured nearly the entire 
shore, and transformed the Mediterranean into a " Grecian 
lake." 

Wherever the Greek went, he remained a Greek. He 
carried with him into barbarian lands the Hellenic language, 
manners, and civihzation. In the colonies the natives learned 
the Grecian tongue, and took on the Grecian mode of thought 
and worship. Moreover, the transplanted Greek matured 
faster than the home growth. So it happened that in the 
magnificent cities which grew up in Asia Minor, philosophy, 
letters, the arts and sciences, bloomed even sooner than in 
Greece itself. 




J.WELLS, DEL 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 119 

Sparta and Athens. — The Dorians and the lonians 
came to be the leading races in Greece. Their diverse 
characteristics had a great influence on its history. The 
Dorians were rough and plain in their habits, sticklers for 
the old customs, friends of an aristocracy, and bitter ene- 
mies of trade and the fine arts. The lonians, on the other 
hand, were refined in their tastes, fond of change, demo- 
cratic, commercial, and passionate lovers of music, painting, 
and sculpture. The rival cities, Sparta and Athens, repre- 
sented these opposing traits. Their deep-rooted hatred was 
the cause of numerous wars which convulsed the country; 
for in the sequel we shall find that the Grecians spent 
their best blood in fighting among themselves, and that 
Grecian history is mostly occupied with the doings of these 
two cities. 

SPARTA. 

Early History. — One of the Dorian bands occupied 
Lacedasmon, called also Sparta from its grain-fields {sparte, 
sown land). The former owners (termed perioe'M, dwellers- 
around) were allowed to keep the poorest of the lands, and 
to be tradesmen and mechanics. But they could neither 
have voice in the government nor intermarry with their 
Dorian conquerors, who now came to be called Spartans. 
The latter took the best farms, and compelled their slaves 
(helots) to work them. The helots were captives or rebels, 
and were at first few, but in the succeeding wars rapidly 
increased. The Spartans (only nine thousand strong in the 
time of Lycurgus), planted thus in the midst of a hostile 
population, were forced to live like soldiers on guard. 

In the rest of the Peloponnesus the Dorians betook 
themselves to peaceful pursuits, and mingled with the na- 



120 GREECE. [850 B.C. 

tives. But in Sparta there was no relaxation, no blend- 
ing. The Dorians there kept on their cold, cruel way. They 
were constantly quarreling among themselves, and so little 
gain did they make, that two centuries and a half passed and 
the Achaeans were still fortified only little over two miles 
away from Sparta. 

Lycurgus,^ according to tradition, was a statesman of 
royal birth who crystallized into a constitution all the pecu- 
liarities of the Spartan character. His whole aim was to 
make the Spartans a race of soldiers. Trade and travel 
were prohibited. No money was allowed except cumbrous 
iron coins^ which no foreigner would take. Most property, 
as slaves, horses, dogs, etc., was held in common. Boys 
were removed from home at the age of seven, and educated 
by state officers. The men ate at pubhc tables, slept in bar- 
racks, and only occasionally visited their homes. Private 
life was given up for the good of the state, and devoted to 
military drill. 

The two kings were retained ; but their power was limited 
by a senate of twenty-eight men over sixty years old, and an 
assembly of all the citizens. The five epliors (overseers) 
chosen annually by the assembly were the real rulers. No 
popular discussion was allowed, nor could a private citizen 
speak in the assembly without special leave from a magis- 
trate. Thus the government became in fact an oligarch}' 
under the guise of a monarchy. The people having prom 
ised to live under this constitution until he should return. 
Lycurgus left Sparta, never to return. 

The Supremacy of Sparta dates from this time. " A 
mere garrison in a hostile country, she became the mistress 

1 Lycurgus, like many other legendary heroes, has been banished by modern 
critics into the region of myth. There seems, however, good evidence that he existed 
about the 9tli century b. c. Just what his laws included, and how far they were his 
own creations, is uncertain. 



743-668 B.C.] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 



121 



of Laconia." The conquest of Messenia, in two long, bloody 
wars, made her dominant in the Peloponnesus. This was 
preceded and followed by several minor wars, all tending 
to increase her territory and establish her authority over her 
neighbors. At the beginning of the 5th century B. c. the 
Spartans had already repeatedly carried their arms across 
the isthmus into Attica, and were ready to assert their posi- 
tion as the leaders in Grecian affairs, when, at this juncture, 
all Greece was threatened by the Persian forces (p, 124). 



ATHENS. 

Early History. — ^Athens, like the other Grecian cities, 
was governed for a time by kings. Cecrops, the first ruler, 
according to the legends, taught the 
people of Attica navigation, marriage, 
and the culture of the olive. CodruSj 
the last monarch, fell (1050 B. c.) while 
resisting the Dorians. After his death 
the nobles selected one of the royal 
family as archon, or chief. At first the 
archon ruled for lifej afterward the 
term was shortened to ten years, and 
finally to one, the nobles choosing nine 
archons from their own number. Thus 
Athens became an aristocratic republic. 

Draco's Code (621 b. c). — But demo- 
cratic spirit was rife. The people com- 
plained that they got no justice from 
the nobles, and the demand for written laws became so ur- 
gent that Draco was directed to prepare a code. His laws 
were so merciless that they were said to have been written 




COIN OF ATHENS. 



122 



GREECE. 



[624 B. c. 




SOLON'S TABLETS. 



in blood, every offense being punished with death. To avoid 
the popular indignation, Draco fled, and his name is to this 
day synonymous with cruelty. His code shows (1) the bar- 
barity of the age, and its lack of sympathy with the poor ; 
(2) the growing spirit of democracy. 

Solon's Constitution ^ (594 b. c). — Party strife was 
now prevalent. The state being threatened with anarchy, 

Solon was appointed 
to draft a new constitu- 
tion. He repealed the 
harsh edicts of Draco ; 
relieved debtors j^ re- 
deemed many slaves; 
forbade parents to sell 
or pawn their children ; 
ordered every father to teach his sons a trade ; and required 
sons to support their aged father if he had educated them. 
He aimed to weaken the nobles and strengthen the people. 
He therefore gave every free-born native of Attica a vote in 
the assembly, where laws were enacted, archons elected, and 
the conduct of officers reviewed. The business presented in 
this assembly was prepared by a senate of four hundred, 
selected annually by lot. 

Property, instead of birth, now gave rank. The people 
were divided into four classes, according to their income. 
Only the three richest classes could hold office, but they 
had to pay the taxes and to equip themselves as soldiers. 
The wealthiest could serve as archons ; those who had thus 
served were ehgible to the Court of Areopagus.^ This court 

1 This famous Athenian lawgiver, descended from the ancient kings, was forced 
by poverty to earn a livelihood. He gained a fortune by commerce, retired from busi- 
ness, and then traveled to the East in search of knowledge. He was reckoned one of 
the Seven Wise Men of Greece (Appendix). 

2 In that age a debtor might be sold into slavery (Nehemiah v. 3, 5 ; 2 Kings iv. 1). 

3 So called because it met on the hill known by that name (Acts xvii. 19). 



560 b. C] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 123 

repealed laws hurtful to the state, looked after public morals, 
and rebuked any person who was not properly bringing up 
his children, or who otherwise lived unworthy an Athenian 

Tyrants. ^ — Athens prospered under Solon's Avise man- 
agement The people got their rights The mortgage-pil- 
lars ^ disappeared. But moderate measures pleased neither 
extreme of society. Class factions strove for power. One 
day Pisis'tratus, a noble aspiring to office, rushed, besmeared 
with blood, into the market place, and, pointing to his self- 
inflicted wounds, asked for a guard, pretending that the 
other nobles had attacked him because he was the people^s 
friend.^ Solon detected the sham, but the people granted 
the request. Pisistratus soon seized the AcropoUs (p. 194), 
and became the first tyrant of Athens. His use of his 
craftily secured place was beneficent. He established Solon's 
laws, erected beautiful public buddings, encouraged art, 
and founded the first library. 

The Pisistrat'idw, Hippias and Hipparchus, trod in their 
father^s steps. But the assassination of Hipparchus im- 
bittered his brother, so that he became moody and cruel. 
His enemies, led by the Alcmseon'idae,* bribed the oracle 

1 The Greeks applied this name at first to a person who became king in a city 
where the law did not authorize one. Afterward the Tyrants became cruel, and the 
word took on the meaning which we now give it 

2 A mortgaged farm was known by a stone pillar marked with amount of loan 
and name of lender. 

3 Solon, though under obligations to his kinsman, Pisistratus, resisted his am- 
bitions. He now exclaimed . "You are but a bad imitation of Ulysses He wounded 
himself to delude his enemies, you to deceive your countrymen." 

4 At the time Draco's laws aroused so much feeling, a noble named Cylon at- 
tempted to make himself tyrant. He seized the Acropolis, but was defeated, and 
his followers, half dead with liunger, were forced to take refuge at the altars of the 
gods. The archon Megacles induced them to surrender on the promise of their lives , 
but they had scarcely left the altars, when his soldiers cut them down. Soon after- 
ward a plague broke out, and the Athenians, believing that a judgment had fallen 
on their city, forced the AlcmaeonidfB (the clan of Megacles) into exile. To atone for 
their impiety, the Alcmieonidte, who were rich, rebuilt the burned temple at Delphi. 
The contract called for common stone, but they faced the building with fine marble, 
and thus gained the favor of the Delphic oracle. 



124 GREECE. [510 B.C. 

at Delphi, so that when the Lacedaemonians consulted the 
priestess, they received the reply, "Athens must be freed." 
The Spartans accordingly invaded Attica and drove away 
the tyrant (510 b. c). Hippias went over to the Persian 
court, and was henceforth the declared enemy of his native 
city. We shall hear from him again. 

Democracy Established. — Aristocratic Sparta had 
only paved the way for a republic. Solon's work now bore 
fruit. CUis'tJienes, an Athenian noble, head of the Alcmte- 
onidse but now candidate of the people's party, became ar- 
chon. All freemen of Attica were admitted to citizenship. 
To break up the four old tribes, and prevent the nobles from 
forming parties among the people of their clans, or accord- 
ing to local interests, he divided the country into districts, 
and organized ten new tribes by uniting non-adjacent dis- 
tricts ; each tribe sent fifty representatives to the senate, 
and also chose a strategus, or general, the ten generals to 
command the army in daily turn. To protect the rising 
democracy from demagogues, he instituted ostracism,^ or 
banishment by popular vote (p. 129). 

The triumph of democracy was complete. Four times a 
month all Athens met to deliberate and decide upon ques- 
tions affecting the public weal. " The Athenians then," says 
Herodotus, " grew mighty, and it became plain that liberty 
is a brave thing." 

It was now near the beginning of the 5th century B. c. 
Both Sparta and Athens had risen to power, when all Greece 
was threatened by a new foe. The young civilization of the 
West was for the first time called to meet the old civiliza- 
tion of the East. In the presence of a common danger, the 
warring states united. The next twenty years were stirring 
ones in the annals of freedom. 

1 strangely enough, Cleisthenes was the first man ostracized. 



500 B. a] 



THE POLITICAL HlSTOBY= 



125 



THE PERSIAN WARS, 

Cause. — The Persian empire now reached the borders of 
Thessaly. The Grecian colonies in Asia Minor had fallen 
into the hands of Cyrus; and the conquering armies of 
Darius were already threatening the freedom of Greece 
itself, when an act of Athens hastened the struggle. The 




OREECE, 

TIME OF THE PERSIAN WARS 



Ionian cities having tried to throw off the Persian yoke, the 
mother city sent them aid.^ The Great King subdued the 
Ionic revolt, and then turned to punish the haughty f oreign- 

1 During tlie brief campaign of the Athenians in Asia Minor, Sardis, the capital 
of Lydia, was accidentally burned. When Darius received this news, he took a bow 
and shot an arrow to the sky, with a prayer to Ahura Mazda (p. 93) for help ; and that 
he might not forget the insult, he ordered that at dinner each day a servant should 
call out thrice, " Master, remember the Athenians." 



126 



Gr K> £i £ £i • 



[493 B. c. 



ers who had dared to meddle in the affairs of his empire, 
and also to force the Athenians to receive back Hippias 
(p. 124) as their tyrant. 

The First Expedition (493 b. c.) against Greecje was 
sent out under Mardonius, the son-in-law of Darius. The 
land troops were defeated in Thrace, and the fleet was shat- 
tered while rounding Mount Athos. Mardonius returned 
without having set foot into the region he went to conquer. 
The Second Expedition. — ^Darius, full of fury, be- 
gan at once raising a new army. Meanwhile heralds were 
dispatched to demand the surrender of the Grecian cities. 
Many sent back earth and water, the oriental symbols of 
submission; Sparta and Athens refused, Sparta throwing 
the envoys into a deep well, and bidding them find there 
the earth and water they demanded. 

Battle of Marathon (490 b. c). — The Persian fleet of 
six hundred triremes (p. 192) safely crossed the ^gean, and 
landed an army of over a hundred thousand on the field 

of Marathon, twenty-two 
miles from Athens. Mil- 
tiades (to whom the other 
strategi had been led by 
Aristides to surrender 
their command) went out 
to meet them with but 
ten thousand soldiers. 
The usual prayers and 
sacrifices were offered, 




^mA ^° 



T'T.ATN OF M ARATHON 



but it was late in the day before the auspices became favor- 
able to an attack. Finding that the Persians had placed their 
best troops at the center, Miltiades put opposite them a weak 
line of men, and stationed heavy files of his choicest soldiers 
on the wings. Giving the enemy no time to hurl their jave- 



490 B. C.J 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 



127 




lins, he immediately charged 
at full speed, and came at once 
to a hand-to-hand fight. The 
powerful wings swept every- 
thing before them, and then, 
wheeling, they fell upon both 

flanks of the Adctorious Persian center. In a few moments 
the Asiatic host were wildly fleeing to their ships. ^ 



1 The Spartans had promised aid, but from religions scrnples the troops were 
unwilling to march until the full moon, and so did not arrive till after the hattle. A 
thousand men from Plataea— all the little city had— stood by the vSide of the Athenians 
on that memorable day. When the victory was gained, Eucles, the swiftest runner 
in Greece, ran with the tidings, and, reaching Athens, had breath only to tell the 
news, when he fell dead in the street. Seven of the Persian vessels were captured by 
the pursuing Greeks. The brother of ^schylus, the poet, is said to have caught a 
trireme by the stern, and to have held it until his hand was hacked off by the enemy. 
Hardly had the Persians and Athenians separated from the last conflict on the beach, 
when the attention of both was arrested by a flash of light on the summit of Mount 
Pentelicus. It was the reflection of the setting sun on the glittering surface of an 
uplifted shield. Miltiades at once saw in this a signal from the traitors in Athens, 
inviting the fleet to join them before he returned. Not a moment was to be lost, and 
he ordered an instant march to tlie city. When the Persian ships arrived, they found 
the heroes of Marathon drawn up on the beach, awaiting them. 



128 GREECE. [490 b. C. 

The JEffect ^ of this victory was to render the reputation 
of Athens for valor and patriotism equal, if not superior, to 
that of Sparta. The Persian invasion had made a union of 
the Hellenic states possible, and Marathon decided that 
Athens should be its leader. 

. Greece was saved, and her deliverer, Miltiades, was for a 
time the favorite hero ; but a disgraceful expedition to the 
Isle of Paros cost him his popularity, and soon after his 
return he died. 

Themistocles and Aristides, generals associated with 
Miltiades at Marathon, now came to be the leading men in 
Athens. The former was an able but often unscrupulous 
statesman ; the latter, a just man and an incorruptible patriot. 
Themistocles foresaw that the Persians would make another 
attempt to subdue Greece j and that Athens, with its excellent 
harbor and commercial facilities, could be far stronger on sea 



1 "So enderl what may truly be cnWeC\. the birthday of Athenian greatness. It 
stood alone in their annals. Other glories were won in alter times, but none ap- 
proached the glory of Marathon. It was uot.merely the ensuing generation that felt 
the effects of that wonderful deliverance It was not merely Themistocles whom 
tlie marble tropliy of Miltiades would not suffer to sleep. It was not merely ^schy- 
lus, who, when his end drew near, passed over all his later achievements in war and 
peace, at Salamis. and in the Dionysiac theater, and recorded in his epitaph only th.e 
one deed of his early days,-that he had repulsed the ' long-haired Medes at Marathon.' 
It was not merely the combatants in the battle wlio told of supernatural assistance 
in the shape of the hero Theseus, or of the mysterious peasant, wielding a gigantic 
plowshare. Everywhere.in the monuments and the customs of their country, and 
for centuries afterward, all Athenian citizens were reminded of that great day, and 
of that alone. The frescoes of a painted portico— the only one of the kind in 
Athens— exhibited in lively colors the scene of the battle The rock of the Acropolis 
was crowned on the eastern extremity by a temple of Wingless Victory, now snp. 
posed to have taken up her abode forevei in the city ; and in its northern precipice, 
the cave, which up to this time had remained untenanted, was consecrated to Pan, 
in commemoration of the mysterious voice which rang through the Arcadian moun 
tains to cheer the forlorn messenger on his empty-handed return from Sparta. The 
one hundred and ninety two Atlienians who had fallen on the field received the 
honor-unique in Athenian history— of burial on the scene of their death (the 
tumulus raised over their bodies by Aristides still remains to mark the spot), their 
names were invoked with hymns and sacrifices down to the latest times of Grecian 
freedom; and long after that freedom had been extinguished, even in the reign of 
Trajan and the Antonines, the anniversary of Marathon was still celebrated, and 
the battle-field was believed to be haunted night after night by the snorting of 
unearthly chargers and the clash of invisible combatants." 



482 b. O.] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 129 

than on land. He therefore urged the building of a fleet. 
Aristides, fond of the old ways, condemned this measure. 
Themistocles, dreading the opposition, secured the ostra- 
cism ^ of his rival. 

Third Expedition. — Darius died before he could make 
a new attempt to punish Athens. But his son Xerxes assem- 
bled over a million soldiers, whom he led in person across 
the Hellespont and along the coast of Thrace and Macedonia. 
A fleet of twelve hundred war-ships and three thousand 
transports kept within easy reach from the shore .^ 

Battle of Thermopylae (480 b. c.).— At the Pass of 
Thermopylae his march was checked by seven thousand 
Greeks under Leonidas, a Spartan. Xerxes sent a messen- 
ger to demand their arms. He received the laconic reply, 
'' Come and take them." For two days the Greeks repulsed 
every attack, and the terrified Persians had to be driven to 
the assault with whips. On the third day, a traitor having 
pointed out to Xerxes a mountain-path, he sent the Immor- 
tals over it, to the rear of the Grecian post. Spartan law 
bade a soldier to die rather than yield. So Leonidas, learn- 
ing of the peril, sent away his allies, retaining only three 
hundred Spartans and seven hundi^ed Thespians, who wished 
to share in the glory of the day. The little band prepared 

1 For the origin of ostracism see p. 124. Into an urn placed in the assembly any 
citizen could drop a shell {ostrakon) bearing the name of the person he wished exiled. 
Six thousand votes against a man banished him for ten years. It is said that on this 
occasion a countryman coming to Aristides. whom he did not know, asked him to 
write Aristides on his shell. " Why, what wrong has he done? " inquired the patriot. 
" None at all," was the reply, "only I am tired of hearing him called the Just " Six 
years later Aristides was recalled. 

2 Two magnificent bridges of boats which he built across the Hellespont having 
been injured m a storm, the story is that Xerxes ordered the sea to be beaten with 
whips, and fetters to be thrown into it to show that he was its master. The vast 
army was seven days in crossing. The king sat on a throne of white marble, in. 
specting the army as it passed. It consisted of forty six different nations, each 
armed and dressed after its own manner, while ships manned by Phoenicians covered 
the sea Xerxes is said to have burst into tears at the thought that in a few years 
not one of all that immense throng would be alive. 



130 



GREECE, 



[480 B. 0. 



for battle, — ^the Spartans combing their long hair, according 
to custom, — and then, scorning to await the attack, dashed 




down the defile to meet the on-coming enemy^ All per- 
ished, fighting to the last.i 



1 "Xerxes could not believe Demaratus, who assured him that the Spartans at 
least were come to dispute the Pass with him, and that it was their custom to trim 
their hair on the eve of a combat. Four days passed before he could be convinced 
that his army must do more than show itself to clear a way for him. On the fifth day 
he ordered a body of Median and Cissian troops to fall upon the rash and insolent 
enemy, and to lead them captive into his presence. He was seated on a lofty throne 
from which he could survey the narrow entrance of the Pass, which, in obedience to 
his commands, his warriors endeavored to force. But they fought on ground where 
their numbers were of no avail, save to increase tlieir confusion, when their attack 
was repulsed: their short spears could not reach their foe; the foremost fell, the 
hinder advancing over their bodies to the charge ; their repeated onsets broke upon 
the Greeks idly, as waves upon a rock. At length, as the day wore on, the Medians 
and Cissians, spent with their efforts and greatly thinned in their ranks, were recalled 
from the contest, which the king now thought worthy of the superior prowess of his 
own guards, the ten thousand Immortals. They were led up as to a certain and easy 
victory ; the Greeks stood their ground as before ; or, if they ever gave way and turned 
their backs, it was only to face suddenly about, and deal tenfold destruction on their 
pursuers. Thrice during these fruitless assaults the king was seen to start up from 
his throne in a transport of fear or rage. The combat lasted the whole day ; the 
slaughter of the barbarians was great ; on the side of the Greeks a few Spartan lives 
were lost; as to the rest, nothing is said. The next day the attack was renewed 
with no better success ; the bands of the several cities that made up the Grecian 
army, except the Phdcians, who were employed in defending the mountain-path by 
which the defile was finally turned, relieved each other at the post of honor ; all stood 
equally firm, and repelled the charge not less vigorously than before. The confidence 
of Xerxes was changed_into despondence and perplexity." 



480 B. c] 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 



131 



The Sacrifice of Leonidas became the inspiration of all 
Greece, and has been the admiration of the lovers of free- 
dom in every age. The names of the three hundred were 












LEONIDAS AT THE PASS OF THEKMOPYLiE. 



familiar to their countrymen, and, six hundred years after, 
a traveler spoke of seeing them inscribed on a pillar at 
Sparta. Upon the mound where the last stand was made 



132 GREECE. [480 b. 0. 

a marble lion was erected to Leonidas, and a pillar to the 
three hundred bore this inscription, written by Simonides 
(p. 164) :- 

" Go, stranger, and to Lacertaemon tell 
That here, obeying her behests, we fell." 

Battle of Sal' amis. — At first, however, the loss at Ther- 
mopylae seemed in vain, and the Asiatic deluge poured south 
over the plains of Greece. Warned by the oracle that the 
safety of Athens lay in her " wooden walls," the inhabitants 
deserted the city, which Xerxes then burned. The ocean, 
however, seemed to "fight for Greece." In a storm the 
Persian fleet lost two hundred ships. But it was still so 
much superior, that the Greeks were fearful, and as usual 
quarreling,^ when Themistocles determined to bring on the 
battle, and accordingly sent a spy to the enemy to say that 
his countrymen would escape if they were not attacked 
immediately. Thereupon the Persians blockaded the Hel- 
lenic fleet in the harbor of Salamis. Animated by the spirit 
of Thermopylae, the Grecians silenced their disputes and 
rushed to the fray. They quickly defeated the Phoenician 
ships in the van, and then the very multitude of the vessels 
caused the ruin of the Persian fleet : for while some were 

1 "All the Thessalians, Locrians, and Boeotians, except the cities of Thespiae 
and Plataea, sent earth and water to the Persian king at the first call to submit, 
although these tokens of subjection were attended by the curses of the rest of the 
Greeks, and the vow that a tithe of their estates should be devoted to the city of 
Delplil. Yet of the Greeks who did not favor Persia, some were willing to assist only 
on condition of being appointed to conduct and command the whole, others, if their 
country could be the first to be protected ; others sent a squadron, which was ordered 
to wait till it was certain which side would gain the victory, and others pretended 
they were held back by the declarations of an oracle." An oft-told story, given in con 
nection with this engagement, illustrates the jealousy of the Grecian generals. They 
were met to decide upon the prize for skill and wisdom displayed in the contest. 
When the votes were collected, it appeared that each commander had placed his own 
name first, and that of Themistocles second. While the Grecian leaders at Salamis 
were deliberating over the propriety of retreat, and Themistocles alone held firm, a 
knock was heard at the door, and Themistocles was called out to speak with a 
stranger. It was the banished Aristides. " Themistocles," said he, " let us be rivals 
still, but let our strife be which best may serve our country." He had crossed from 
.^gina in an open boat to inform his countrymen that they were surrounded by the 
enemy. 



480 B.C.] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 133 

trjdng to escape, and some to come to the front, tlie Greeks, 
amid the confusion plying every weapon, sunk two hundred 
vessels, and put the rest to flight. 

Xerxes, seated on a lofty throne erected on the beach, 
watched the contest. Terrified by the destruction of his 
fleet, he fled into Asia, leaving three hundred and fifty thou- 
sand picked troops under Mardonius to continue the war. 

Battle of Himera. — While the hosts of Xerxes were pour- 
ing into Hellas on the northeast, she was assailed on the 
southwest by another formidable foe. An immense fleet, 
three thousand ships-of-war, sailing from Carthage to Sicily, 
landed an army under Hamilcar,^ who laid siege to Himera. 
Gelo, tyrant of Syracuse, marched to the relief of Himera, 
and on the very day of Salamis utterly routed the Phoenician 
forces. The tyranny of the commercial ohgarchy of Carthage 
might have been as fatal to the Hberties of Europe as the 
despotism of Persia. 

Battle of Platcea (479 B. c). — Mardonius wintered in 
Thessaly, and the next summer invaded Attica. The half- 
rebuilt houses of Athens were again leveled to the ground. 
Finally the allies, over one hundred thousand strong, 
took the field under Pausanias, the Spartan. After the two 
armies had faced each other for ten days, want of water 
compelled Pausanias to move his camp. While en routes 
Mardonius attacked his scattered forces. The omens were 
unfavorable, and the Glrecian leader dare not give the signal 
to engage. The Spartans protected themselves with their 
shields as best they could against the shower of arrows. 
Many Greeks were smitten, and fell, lamenting, not that they 
must fall, but that they could not strike a blow for their 
country. Id his distress, Pausanias lifted up his streaming 
eyes toward the temple of Hera, beseeching the goddess, that, 

1 This was an ancestor of the Hamllcar of Punic fame (p. 230). 



134 GREECE. [479 b. c. 

if the Fates forbade the Greeks to conquer, they might die 
like men. Suddenly the sacrifices became auspicious. The 
Spartans, charging in compact rank, shield touching shield, 
with their long spears swept all before them. The Athenians, 
coming up, stormed the intrenched camp. Scarcely forty 
thousand Persians escaped. The booty was immense. 
Wagons were piled up with vessels of gold and silver, jewels, 
and articles of luxury. One tenth of all the plunder was 
dedicated to the gods. The prize of valor was adjudged to 
the Plataeans, and they were charged to preserve the graves 
of the slain, Pausanias promising with a solemn oath that 
the battle-field should be sacred forever. 

That same day the Grecian fleet, having crossed the 
^gean, destroyed the Persian fleet at Mycale in Asia Minor. 

The Effect of Marathon, Thermopylae, Salamis, Plataea, 
and Mycale was to give the death-blow to Persian rule in 
Europe. Grecian valor had saved a continent from eastern 
slavery and barbarism. More than that, the Persian wars gave 
rise to the real Hellenic civilization, and Marathon and Sala- 
mis may be looked upon as the birthplaces of Grecian glory. 

Athenian Supremacy. — Greece was now, to para- 
phrase the language of Diodorus, at the head of the world, 
Athens at the head of Greece, and Themistocles at the head 
of Athens. The city of Athens was quickly rebuilt. During 
the recent war the Spartan soldiers had taken the lead, but 
Pausanias afterward proved a traitor, and, as Athens was so 
strong in ships, she became the acknowledged leader of all 
the Grecian states. A league, called the Confederation of 
Delos i^ll B. c), was formed to keep the Persians out of the 
^gean. The different cities annually contributed to Athens 
a certain number of ships, or a fixed sum of money for the 
support of the navy. The ambition of Themistocles was to 
form a grand maritime empire, but, his share in the treason 



478b,Oo] 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 



135 



of Pausanias having been discovered, he was ostracized. 
Aristides, seeing the drift of affairs, had changed his views, 
and was ah'eady the popular commander of the fleet. 




mPhebes 

\ "B (EHO 



VICINITY OF 

ATHENS 

AND 

SALAMIS 



Though the head of the party of the nobles, he secured a 
law abolishing the property qualification, and allowing any 
person to hold office.i 



AGE OF PERICLES. 

(479-429 B. c.) 

The Leading Men at Athens, after the death of Aris- 
tides, were Pericles and Gimon. The heroes of the Persian 
invasions had passed from the stage, and new actors now 
appeared. 

1 The thouglitful student of history cannot but pause here to consider the fate 
of these three great contemporary men,— Pausanias, Themistocles, and Aristides. 
Pausanias fled to the temple of Minerva. The Spartans, not daring to violate this 
sanctuary, blocked the door (the traitor's mother laying the first stone), tore off the 
roof, guarded every avenue, and left the wretch to die of cold and hunger. Themis- 
tocles was welcomed by Artaxerxes, then King of Persia, and assigned the revenue 
of three cities. He lived like a prince, but finally ended his pitiable existence, it is 
said, with poison. Aristides the Just went down to his grave full of honors. The 
treasurer of the league, he had yet been so honest that tradition says he did not leave 
enough money to meet his funeral expenses. The grateful republic paid these rites, 
finished the education of his son, and portioned his daughters. 



136 GREECE. [466 B.C. 

Cimon ^ renewed the glory of his father Miltiades, the 
victor at Marathon. He pushed on the war in Asia Minor 
against Persia with great vigor, finally routing her land and 
sea forces in the decisive battle of the JEurymedon (466 b. c). 
As the head of the nobles, he was naturally friendly to aris- 
tocratic Sparta. The Helots and Messenians, taking advan- 
tage of an earthquake which nearly destroyed that city, 
revolted, and a ten-years' struggle (known in history as 
the Third Messenian War) ensued. The haughty Spartans 
were driven to ask aid from Athens. By the influence of 
Cimon, this was granted. But the Spartans became fearful 
of their allies, and sent the army home. AU Athens rose in 
indignation, and Cimon was ostracized (461 B. c.) for expos- 
ing his city to such insult. 

Pericles,^ who was the leader of the democracy, now 

1 Cimon was the richest man in Athens. He kept open tahle for tlie public. 
A body of servants laden with cloaks followed him through the streets, and gave a 
garment to any needy person whom he met. His pleasure-garden was free for all to 
enter and pluck fruit or flowers. He planted oriental plane-trees in the market place ; 
bequeathed to Athens the groves, afterward the Academy of Plato, with its beautiful 
fountains; built marble colonnades where the people were wont to promenade; and 
gave magnificent dramatic entertainments at his private expense. 

2 "To all students of Grecian literature, Pericles must always appear as the central 
figure of Grecian history. His form, manner, and outward appearance are well 
known. We can imagine that stern and almost forbidding aspect which repelled 
rather than invited intimacy; the majestic stature; the long head,— long to dispro- 
portion,— already, before his fiftieth year, silvered over with the marks of age ; the 
sweet voice and rapid enunciation— recalling, thougli by an unwelcome association, 
the likeness of his ancestor Pisistratus. We knew the stately reserve which reigned 
through his whole life and manners. Those grave features were never seen to relax 
into laughter, twice only in his long career to melt into tears. For the whole forty 
years of his administration he never accepted an invitation to dinner but once, and 
that to his nephew's wedding, and then staid only till the libation [p. 199]. That 
princely courtesy could never be disturbed by the bitterest persecution of aristocratic 
enmity or popular irritation. To the man who had followed him all the way from the 
assembly to his own house, loading him with the abusive epithets with which, as 
we know from Aristophanes, the Athenian vocabulary was so richly stored, he paid 
no other heed tlian, on arriving at his own door, to turn to his torch-bearer with an 
order to light his reviler home. In public it was the same. Amidst the passionate 
gesticulations of Athenian oratory, amidst the tempest of an Athenian mob, his self- 
possession was never lost, his dress was never disordered, his language was ever 
studied and measured. Every speech that he delivered he wrote down previously. 
Every time that he spoke he offered up a prayer to Heaven that no word might escape 
his lips which he should wish unsaid. But when he did speak the effect was almost 



461 B.C.] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 137 

had everything his own way. A mere private citizen, living 
plainly and unostentatiously, this great-hearted man, by his 
eloquence, genius, adi'oitness, and wisdom, shaped the policy 
of the state. Opposing foreign conquest, he sought home 
development. He was bent on keeping Athens all-powerful 
in (xreece, and on making the people all-powerful in Athens. 
He had perfect confidence in a government by the people, 
if they were only properly educated. There were then no 
common schools or daily papers, and he was forced to use 
what the times supplied. He paid for all service in the 
army, on juries, at religious festivals and civil assemblies, 
so that the poorest man could take part in public affairs. 
He had the grand dramas of ^schylus, Euripides, and 
Sophocles performed free before the multitude. He erected 
magnificent public buildings, and adorned them with the 
noblest historical paintings. He enriched the temples of the 
gods with beautiful architecture and the exquisite sculptures 
of Phidias. He encouraged poets, artists, philosophers, and 
orators to do their best work. Under his fostering care, the 
Age of Pericles became the finest blossom and fruitage of 
Hellenic civilization. 

Athens Ornamented and Fortified. — Matchless 
colonnades and temples were now erected, which are yet the 
wonder of the world. The Acropolis was so enriched with 

awful. The ' fierce democracy ' was struck down before it. It could be compared to 
nothing short of the thundeis and lightnings of that Olympian Jove whom in majesty 
and dignity he resembled. It left the irresistible impression that he was always in 
the right. ' He not only throws me in the wrestle,' said one of his rivals, ' but wflen 
I have thrown him, he will make the people think that it is I and not he who has 
fallen.' What Themistocles, what Aristides, what Cimon, said, has perished from 
memory; but the condensed and vivid rlietorical images of Pericles were handed 
down from age to age as specimens of that eloquence which had held Athens and 
Greece in awe 'The lowering of the storm of war' from Peloponnesus— 'the spring 
taken out of the year' in the loss of the flower of Athenian youths— the comparison 
of Greece to 'a chaiiot drawn by two horses'— of ^gina to 'the eyesore of the 
Piraeus'- of Athens to ' the school of Greece'— were traditionary phrases which later 
writers preserved, and which Thucydides either introduced or imitated in the 
'Funeral Oration ' which he has put in his moutli." 



138 



GREECE. 



[455 B. C. 



magnificent structures that it was called "the city of the 
gods." The Long Walls were built two hundred yards 
apart, and extended over four miles from Athens to Pir^us 
— its harbor. Thus the capital was connected with the sea, 
and, while the Athenians held the command of the ocean, 
their ships could bring them supplies, even when the city 
should be surrounded by an enemy on land. 




A SCENE IN ATHENS IN THE TIME OF PERICLES. 

The Wonderful Spirit and enterprise of the Athenians 
are shown from the fact that, while they were thus erecting 
great public works at home, they were during a single year 
(458 B. c.) waging war in Cyprus, in Egypt, in Phoenicia, off 



450 b. C] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 139 

^gina, and on the coast of Peloponnesus. The Corinthians, 
knowing that the Athenian troops were occupied so far from 
home, invaded Megara, then in alliance with Athens, but 
the " boys and old men " of Athens sallied out and routed 
them. So completely was the tide turned, that (450 b. c.) 
Artaxerxes I. made a treaty with Athens, agreeing to the 
independence of the Grecian cities in Asia Minor, and 
promising not to spread a sail on the ^gean Sea, nor bring 
a soldier Avithin three days' march of its coast. 

PELOPONNESIAN WAR. 

(431-404 B. c.) 
Causes of the War. — The meddhng of Athens in the 
affairs of her allies, and the use of their contributions 
(p. 134) to erect her own public buildings, had aroused bitter 
hatred. Sparta, jealous of the glory and fame of her rival, 
watched every chance to interfere. At last an opportunity 
came. A quarrel arose between Corinth and her colony 
of Corcyra. Athens favored Corcyra ; Sparta, Corinth. 
Nearly all Greece took sides in the dispute, according to race 
or pohtical sympathy ; the real question at issue being the 
broad one, whether the ruhng power in Hellas should be 
Athens — Ionic, democratic and maritime ; or Sparta — Doric, 
aristocratic and military. The lonians and the democracy 
naturally aided Athens; the Dorians and the aristocracy, 
Sparta. Both parties were sometimes found withm the same 
city, contending for the supremacy. 



Allies of Athens. 
All the islands of the ^Egean (except 
Melos and Thera), Corcyra, Zacynthos, 
Chios, Leshos, and Samos ; the nu- 
merous Greek colonies on the coast 
of Asia Minor, Thrace, and Macedon; 
Naupactus, Platsea, and a part of Acar- 
nania. 



Allies of Sparta. 
All the states of the Peloponnesus 
(except Argos and Achaia, which re- 
mained neutral) ; Locris, Phocis, and 
Megara ; Ambracia, Anactorium, and 
the island of Leucas; and the strong 
Boeotian League, of which Thebes was 
the head. 



140 GREECE. [431 B.C. 

Conduct of the War. — The Spartan plan was to invade 
Attica, destroy the crops, and persuade the Athenian allies to 
desert her. As Sparta was strong on land, and Athens on 
water, Pericles ordered the people of Attica to take refuge 
within the Long Walls of the city, while, the fleet and army 
ravaged the coast of the Peloponnesus. When, therefore, 
Archida^mus, king of Sparta, invaded Attica, the people 
flocked into the city with all .their movable possessions. 
Temporary buildings were erected in every vacant place in 
the public squares and streets, while the poorest of the 
populace were forced to seek protection in squalid huts 
beneath the shelter of the Long Walls. Pitiable indeed was 
the condition of the inhabitants during these hot summer 
days, as they saw the enemy, without hindrance, burning 
their homes and destroying their crops, while the Athenian 
fleet was off ravaging the coast of Peloponnesus. But it 
was worse the second year, when a fearful pestilence broke 
out in the crowded population. Many died, among them 
Pericles himself (429 B. c.).^ This was the greatest loss of 
all, for there was no statesman left to guide the people. 

1 " When, at the opening of the Peloponnesian war, the long enjoyment of every 
comfort which peace and civilization could bring was interrupted by hostile invasion ; 
when the whole population of Attica was crowded within the city of Athens ; when, 
to the inflammable materials which the populace of a Grecian town would always 
afford, were added the discontented land-owners and peasants from the countiy, who 
were obliged to exchange the olive glades of Colonus, the thymy slopes of Hymettus, 
and the oak forests of Acharnte, for the black shade of the Pelasgicum and the 
stifling huts along the dusty plain between the Long Walls ; when witliout were 
seen the fire and smoke ascending from the ravage of their beloved orchards and 
gardens, and within the excitement was aggravated by the little knots which gath- 
ered at every corner, and by the predictions of impending evil which were handed 
about from mouth to mouth,— when all these feelings, awakened by a situation so 
wholly new in a population so Irritable, turned against one man as the author of the 
present distress, then it was seen how their respect for that one man united with 
their inherent respect for law to save the state. Not only did Pericles restrain the 
more eager spirits from sallying forth to defend their burning property, not only did 
he calm and elevate their despondency by his speeches in the Pnyx and Ceramicus, 
not only did he refuse to call an assembly, but no attempt at an assembly was ever 
made. The groups in the streets never grew into a mob, and, even when to the hor- 
rors of a blockade were added those of a pestilence, public tranquillity was never for 
a moment disturbed, the order of the constitution was never for a moment infringed. 



i29B. C] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 141 

Demagogues now arose, chief among whom was Cleon, a 
cruel, arrogant boaster, who gained power by flattering the 
populace. About this time, also, the Spartans began to 
build ships to dispute the empire of the sea, on wliich Athens 
had so long triumphed. 

The Memorable Siege of Plataea, which began in the 
third year of the war, illustrates the desperation and destruc- 
tion that characterized this terrible struggle of twenty- 
seven years. In spite of Pausanias's oath (p. 134), Archida'- 
mus with the Spartan army attacked this city, which was 
defended by only four hundred and eighty men. First the 
Spartan general closed every outlet by a wooden palisade, 
and constructed an inclined plane of earth and stone, 
up which his men could advance to hurl their weapons 
against the city. This work cost seventy days' labor of the 
whole army, but the garrison undermined the mound and 
destroyed it entirely. Next the Spartans built around the 

And yet the man who thus swayed the minds of his fellow-citizens was the reverse 
of a demagogue. Unlike his aristocratic rival, Cimon, he never won their favor hy 
indiscriminate bounty Unlike his democratic successor, Cleon, he never influenced 
their passions hy coarse invectives. Unlike his kinsman, Alcibiades, he never sought 
to dazzle them by a display of his genius or his wealth. At the very moment when 
Pericles was preaching the necessity of manful devotion to the common country, he 
was himself the greatest of sufferers. The epidemic carried off his two sons, his 
sister, several other relatives, and his best and most useful political friends. Amidst 
this train of calamities he maintained his habitual self command, until the death of 
his favorite son Paralus left his house without a legitimate representative to maintain 
the family and its hereditary sacred rites. On tbis final blow,— the greatest that, 
•according to the Greek feeling, could befall any human being,— though he strove to 
command himself as before, yet at the obsequies of thfe young man, when it became 
his duty to place a garland on the dead body, liis grief 'Gecame uncontrollable, and he 
burst into tears. Every feeling of resentment seems to have passed away from the 
hearts of the Athenian people before the touching sight of the marble majesty of 
their great statesman yielding to the common emotion of their own excitable nature. 
Every measure was passed which could alleviate this deepest sonow of his declining 
age. But it was too late, and he soon sank into the stupor from which he never 
recovered. As he lay apparently iiassive in the hands of tlie nurse, who had hung 
round his neck the amulets which in life and health he had scorned, whilst his 
friends were dwelling with pride on the nine trophies which on Bceotia and Samos, and 
on the shores of Peloponnesus, bore witness to his success during his forty years' 
career, the dying man suddenly broke in with the emphatic words, ' That of which I 
am most proud you have left unsaid: No Athenian, through my fault, was ever 
clothed in the black garb of mourning.' " —Quarterly Review 



429-427 B.C.] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 143 

city two concentric walls, and roofed over the space between 
them so as to give shelter to the soldiers on guard. For two 
long years the Plataeans endured all the horrors of a siege. 
Provisions ran low, and one stormy December night a part 
of the men stole out of the gate, placed ladders against the 
Spartan w\all, climbed to the top, killed the sentinels, and 
escaped through the midst of the enemy with the loss of only 
one man. The rest of the garrison were thus enabled to 
hold out some time longer. But at length their food was 
exhausted, and they were forced to surrender. The cruel 
Spartans put every man to death, and then, to please the 
Thebans, razed the city to the ground. Heroic Httle Platasa 
was thus blotted out of the map of Greece.^ 

Alcibi'ades, a young nobleman, the nephew of Pericles 
and pupil of Socrates, by his wealth, beauty, and talent, 
next won the ear of the crowd. Reckless and dissolute, 
with no heart, conscience, or principle, he cared for nothing 
except his own ambitious schemes. Though peace had then 
come through the negotiations of Nicias, the favorite 
Athenian general, it was broken by the influence of this 
demagogue, and the bloody contest renewed. 

Expedition to Sicily (415 b. c). — The oppressions of 
the tyrants of Syracuse, a Dorian city in Sicily, gave an ex- 
cuse for seizing that island, and Alcibiades advocated this 
brilliant scheme, which promised to make Athens irresistible. 
The largest fleet and army Hellas had yet sent forth were 
accordingly equipped. One morning, just before their de- 
parture, the busts of Hermes, that were placed along the roads 
of Attica to mark the distance, and in front of the Athenian 
houses as protectors of the people, were found to be muti- 
lated. The populace, in dismay, lest a curse should fall on 
the city, demanded the punishment of those who had com- 

1 It was restored 387 b. c, again destroyed 374 b. c, and again rebuilt 338 B. c. 



144 GREECE. [415 b. 0. 

mitted this sacrilegious act. It was probable that some 
drunken revelers had done the mischief ; but the enemies of 
Alcibiades made the people believe that he was the offender. 
After he sailed he was cleared of this charge, but a new one 
impended. This was that he had privately performed the 
Eleusinian mysteries (p. 184) for the amusement of his 
friends. To answer this heinous offense, Alcibiades was 
summoned home, but he escaped to Sparta, and gave the 
rival city the benefit of his powerful support. Meanwhile 
the exasperated Athenians condemned him to death, seized 
his property, and called upon the priests to pronounce him 
accursed. 

The expedition had now lost the only man who could 
have made it a success. Nicias, the commander, was old 
and sluggish. Disasters followed apace. Finally Gylippus, 
a famous Spartan general, came to the help of Syi'acuse. 
Athens sent a new fleet and army, but she did not furnish a 
better leader, and the reenforcement served only to increase 
the final ruin. In a great sea-fight in the harbor of Syracuse 
the Athenian ships were defeated, and the troops attempt- 
ing to flee by land were overtaken and forced to surrender 
(413 B. c). 

Fall of Athens. — The proud city was now doomed. 
Her best soldiers were dying in the dungeons of Syracuse. 
Her treasury was empty. Alcibiades was pressing on her 
destruction with aU his revengeful genius. A Spartan gar- 
rison held Decelea, in the heart of Attica. The Athenian 
allies dropped off. The Ionic colonies revolted. Yet with 
the energy of despair Athens dragged out the unequal con- 
test nine years longer. The recall of Alcibiades gave a 
gleam of success. But victory at the price of submission 
to such a master was too costly, and he was dismissed. 
Persian gold gave weight to the Lacedaemonian sword and 



405 B.C.] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 145 

equipped her fleet. The last ships of Athens were taken 
by Lysander, the Spartan, at ^gospotami in the Hellespont 
(405 B. c). Sparta now controlled the sea, and Athens, its 
harbor blockaded, suffered famine in addition to the horrors 
of war. The proud city surrendered at last (404 B. c). Her 
ships were given up 5 and the Long Walls were torn down 
amid the playing of flutes and the rejoicings of dancers, 
crowned with garlands, as for a festival. " That day was 
deemed by the Peloponnesians," says Xenophon, " the com- 
mencement of liberty for Greece." 

Thus ended the Peloponnesian war, twenty-seven years 
after its commencement, and seventy-six years after Salamis 
had laid the foundation of the Athenian power. Athens 
had fallen, but she possessed a kingdom of which Sparta 
could not deprive her. She still remained the mistress of 
Greece in hterature and art. 

The Thirty Tyrants. — A Spartan garrison was now 
placed on the Acropolis at Athens, and an ohgarchy of thirty 
persons established. A reign of terror followed. The 
" Thirty Tyrants " put hundreds of citizens to death without 
form of trial. After they had ruled only eight months, the 
Athenian exiles returned in arms, overthrew the tyrants, and 
reestablished a democratic government. 

Retreat of the Ten Thousand (401 b. c). — Now that 
peace had come at home, over ten thousand restless Greeks ^ 
went away to help Cyrus the Younger, satrap of Asia Minor, 
dethrone his elder brother, Artaxerxes. At Cunaxa, near 
Babylon, they routed the Persians. But Cyrus fell, and, to 
complete their misfortune, their chief officers were induced 
to visit the enemy's camp, where they were treacherously 
taken prisoners. Left thus in the heart of the Persian Em- 

1 Greece at this time was full of soldiers of fortune,— men wlio made war a trade, 
and served anybody who was able to pay them. 



146 GREECE. [401b. C. 

pire, the little army chose new captains, and decided to cut 
its way home again. All were ignorant alike of the route 
and the language of the people. Hostile troops swarmed 
on every side. Guides misled them. Famine threatened 
them. Snows overwhelmed them. Yet they struggled on 
for months. When one day ascending a mountain, there 
broke from the van the joyful shout of "The sea! The 
sea ! " It was the Euxine,— a branch of that sea whose 
waters washed the shores of their beloved Greece. 

About three-fourths of the original number survived to 
tell the story of that wonderful march (p. 172). Such an 
exploit, while it honored the endurance of the Greek soldier, 
revealed the weakness of the Persian Empire. 



LACED^MON AND THEBAN DOMINION. 

Lacedsemon R-ule (405-371 b. c). — -Tempted by the glit- 
tering prospect of Eastern conquest, Sparta sent Agesila'us 
into Asia. His success there made Artaxerxes tremble for 
his throne. Again Persian gold was thrown into the scale. 
The Athenians were helped to rebuild the Long Walls, and 
soon their flag floated once more on the ^gean. Conon, the 
Athenian admiral, defeated the Spartan fleet off Cnidus, 
near Rhodes (394 b. c). In Greece the Spartan rule, cruel 
and coarse, had already become unendurable. In every 
town Sparta sought to estabhsh an oligarchy of ten citizens 
favorable to herself, and a harmost, or governor. Wherever 
popular liberty asserted itself, she endeavored to extinguish 
it by military force. But the cities of Corinth, Argos, 
Thebes, and Athens struck for freedom. Sparta was forced 
to recall Agesilaus. Strangely enough, she now made friends 
with the Persian king, who dictated the Peace of Antalci' 



387 B.C.] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 147 

das ^ (387 B. c). This ended the war, and gave Asia Minor 
to Persia. So low had Hellas fallen since the days of Salamis 
and Plataea ! 

Theban Rule (371-362 b. c.).— At the very height of 
Sparta's arrogance her humiliation came. The Boeotian 
League (p. 139) having been restored, and the oligarchical 
governments favorable to Sparta overthrown, a Spartan 
army invaded that state. At this juncture there arose in 
Thebes a great general, Epaminondas, who made the Theban 
army the best in the land. On the famous field of Leuctra 
(371 B. c), by throwing heavy columns against the long 
lines of Spartan soldiers, he beat them for the first time in 
their history.^ The charm of Lacedaemonian invincibihty 
was broken. The stream of Persian gold now turned into 
Thebes. The tyrannical Spartan liarmosts were expelled 
from all the cities. To curb the power of Sparta, the inde- 
pendence of Messenia, after three centuries of slavery, was 
reestabhshed (p. 121). Arcadia was united in a league, 
having as its head Megalopolis, a new city now founded. A 
wise, pure-hearted statesman, Epaminondas sought to com- 
bine Hellas, and not, like the leaders of Athens or Sparta, 

1 So namerl from the Spartan envoy who managed it. This peace was a mournful 
incident in Grecian history. Its true character cannot be better described than by a 
brief remark and reply cited in Plutarch : " Alas, for Hellas! " observed some one to 
.Agesilaus, " when we see our Laconians Medizing ! " — " Nay," replied the Spartan 
king, "say rather the Medes (Persians) Laconizing." 

2 The Spartan lines were twelve ranks deep. Epaminondas (fighting en echelon) 
made his, at the point where he wished to break through, fifty ranks deep. At his 
side always fought his intimate friend Pelopidas, who commanded the Sacred Band. 
This consisted of three hundred brothers-iu -arms,— men who had known one another 
from childhood, and were sworn to live and die together. In the crisis of the struggle 
Epaminondas cheered his men with the words, " One step forward ! " While the by- 
standers after the battle were congratulating him over his victory, he replied that 
his greatest pleasure was in thinking how it would gratify liis father and mother. 
Soon after Epaminondas returned from the battle of Leuctra. his enemies secured 
his election as public scavenger. The noble-spirited man immediately accepted the 
office, declaring tliat " the place did not confer dignity on the man, but the man on 
the place," and executed the duties of this unworthy post so efficiently as to baffle 
the malice of his foes. 



14S aREECE. 



[362 B. c. 



selfishly to rule it. Athens at first aided him, and then, 
jealous of his success, sided with Lacedeemon. At Mantinea 
(362 B. c), in Arcadia, Epaminondas fought his last battle, 
and died at the moment of victory. ^ As he alone had made 
Thebes great, she dropped at once to her former level. 

Three states in succession — ^Athens, Sparta, and Thebes — 
had risen to take the lead in Greece. Each had faUed. 
Hellas now lay a mass of quarreling, struggling states. 



MACEDONIAN EMPIRE. 

Rise of Macedonia. — The Macedonians were aUied to 
the Grreeks, and their kings took part in the Olympian 
games. They were, however, a very different people. In- 
stead of hving in a multitude of free cities, as in Greece, 
they dwelt in the country, and were all governed by one 
king. The polite and refined Athenian looked upon the 
coarse Macedonian as almost a barbarian. But about the 
time of the fall of Athens these rude northerners were fast 
taking on the Greek civilization. 

Philip (359-336 b. c.) came to the throne of Macedonia 
well schooled for his career. A hostage for many years at 
the Theban court, he understood Grecian diplomacy and 
military art. He was now determined to be recognized not 
only as a Greek among Greeks, but as the head of all Greece. 
To this he bent every energy of his strong, wUy nature. 
He extended his kingdom, and made it a compact empire. 
He thoroughly organized his army, and formed the famous 

1 He was pierced with a javelin, and to extract the weapon would cause his death 
by bleeding. Being carried out of the battle, like a true soldier he asked first about 
his shieldj then waited to learn the issue of the contest. Hearing the cries of vic- 
tory, he drew out the shaft with his own hand, and died a few moments after. 



359 B. c] 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 



149 




PORTEAIT OF PHILIP OF 
MACEDON. 



Macedonian phalanx/ that, for two centuries after, decided 
the day on every field on which it appeared. He craftily 
mixed in Grecian affairs, and took snch an active part in the 
Sacred War 2 (355-346 b. c), that he 
was admitted to the Amphictyonic 
Council (p. 115). Demosthenes, the 
great Athenian orator, seemed the 
only man clear-headed enough to 
detect Philip's scheme. His eloquent 
^' Philippics " (p. 202) at last aroused 
his apathetic countrymen to a sense 
of their danger. The Second Sacred 
War, declared by the Amphictyons 
against theLocrians for alleged sacri- 
lege, having been intrusted to Philip, 
that monarch marched through Ther- 
mopylae, and his designs against the 
liberties of Greece became but too evident. Thebes and 
Athens now took the field. But at Cheer one' a (338 b. c.) the 
Macedonian phalanx annihilated their armies, the Sacred 
Band perishing to a man. 

Greece was prostrate at Philip's feet. In a congress of 

1 The peculiar feature of this body was that the men were armed witli huge 
lances twenty-one feet long. The lines were placed so that the front rank, composed 
of the strongest and most experienced soldiers, was protected by a bristling mass of 
five rows of lance-points, their own extending fifteen feet before them, and the rest 
twelve, nine, six, and three feet respectively. Formed in a solid mass, usually six- 
teen ranks deep, shield touching shield, and maiching with the precision of a ma- 
chine, the phalanx charge was irresistible. The Spartans, carrying spears only about 
half as long, could not reach the Macedonians. 

2 The pretext for the First Sacred War Is said to have been that the Phocians 
had cultivated lands consecrated to Apollo. The Amphictyonic Council, led by 
Thebes, Inflicted a heavy fine upon them. Thereupon they seized the Temple at 
Delphi, and finally, to furnish means for prolonging the struggle, sold the riches 
accumulated from the pious offerings of the men of a better daj\ The Grecians 
were first shocked and then demoralized by this impious act. The holiest objects 
circulated among tlie people, and were put to common uses. All reverence for the 
gods and sacred things was lost. The ancient patriotism went with the religion 
and Hellas was forever fallen from her high estate. Everywhere her sous were ready 
to sell their swords to the liighest bidder. 



150 



GREECE, 



[337-336 B. c. 



all the states except Sparta, he was appointed to lead their 
united forces against Persia. But while preparing to start 
he was assassinated (336 B. c.) at his daughter's marriage feast. 




A TETRADRACHM OF ALEXANDER THE GREAT. 

Alexander, 1 his son, succeeded to Philip's throne and 
ambitious projects. Though only twenty years old, he was 

1 On the clay of Alexander's birth, Philip received news of the defeat of the 
lUyrians, and that his horses had won in tlie Olympian chariot-races. Overwhelmed 
by such fortune, the monarch exclaimed, "Gieat Jupiter, send me only some slight 
reverse in return for so many blessings ! " That same day also the famous Temple 
of Diana, at Ephesus, was burned by an incendiary. Alexander was wont to consider 
this an omen that he should himself kindle a flame in Asia. On his father's side he was 
said to be descended from Hercules, and on his mother's from Achilles. He became 
a pupil of Aristotle (p. 176), to whom Philip wrote, announcing Alexander's birth, 
saying that he knew not which gave him the gieater pleasure,— that he had a son, or 
that Aristotle could be his son's teacher. The young piince at fourteen tamed the 
noble horse Bucephalus, which no one at the Macedonian court dared to mount ; at 
sixteen he saved his father in battle, and at eighteen defeated the Sacred Band 
upon the field at Chseronea. Before setting out upon his Persian expedition, he con. 
suited the oracle at Delphi. The priestess refused to go to the shrine, as it was an 
unlucky day. Alexander thereupon grasped her arm. "Ah, my son," exclaimed 
she, " thou art irresistible! "—"Enough," shouted the delighted monarch, "I ask 
no other reply." He was equally happy of thought at Gordium. Here he was shown 
the famous Gordian knot, which, it was said, no one could untie except the one des- 
tined to be the conqueror of Asia. He tried to unravel the cord, but, failing, drew 
his sword and severed it at a blow. Alexander- always retained a warm love for his . 
mother, Olympias. She, however, was a violent woman. Antip'ater, who was left r 
governor of Macedon during Alexander's absence, wrote, complaining of her conduct. 
"Ah," said the king, " Antipater does not know that one tear of a mother will blot 
out ten thousand of his letters." Unfortunately, the hero who subdued the known 
world had never conquered liimself. In a moment of drunken passion he slew Clltus, 
his dearest friend, who had saved his life in battle. He shut himself up for days 
after this horrible deed, lamenting his crime, and refusing to eat or to transact any 
business. Yet in soberness and calmness lie tortured and hanged Callisthenes, a 
Greek author, because he would not worship lilm as a god. Carried away by his 
success, he finally sent to Greece, ordering lii.s name to be enrolled among the deities. 
Said the Spartans in reply, " If Alexander will be a god, let him." 



336 b. C] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 151 

more than his father's equal in statesmanship and military 
skill. Thebes having revolted, he sold its inhabitants as 
slaves, and razed the city, sparing only the temples and the 
house of Pindar the poet. This terrible example quieted 
aU opposition. He was at once made captain-general of the 
Grecian forces to invade Persia, and, soon after, he set out 
upon that perilous expedition from which he never returned. 
Alexander's Marches and Conquests. — In 334 b. c. 
Alexander crossed the Hellespont with thirty thousand in- 
fantry and four thousand five hundred cavalry. He was the 
first to leap on the Asiatic shore.^ Pressing eastward, he 
defeated the Persians in two great battles, — one at the river 
Granicus, and the other at Issiis.^ Then he turned south 
and besieged Tyre. To reach the island on which the city 
stood, he built a stone pier two hundred feet wide and half 
a mile long, on which he rolled his ponderous machines, 
breached the wall, and carried the place by a desperate 
assault. Thence passing into Egypt, that country fell with- 
out a blow. Here he founded the famous city of Alexandria 
(p. 154). Resuming his eastern march, he routed the Persian 
host, a million strong, on the decisive field of Arhela. Baby- 
lon was entered in triumph. Persepolis (p. 94) was burned 
to avenge the destruction of Athens one hundred and fifty 
years before (p. 132). Darius was pursued so closely, that, 
to prevent his falling into the conqueror's possession, he was 
slain by a noble. 

1 Alexander was a great lover of Homer (p. 162), and slept with a copy of the Iliad 
under his pillow. Wliile his army was now landing, he visited the site of Troy, offered 
a sacrifice at the tomb of Achilles, hung up his own shield in the temple, and, taking 
down one said to have belonged to a hero of the Trojan war, ordered it to be 
henceforth carried before him in battle. 

2 Just before this engagement Alexander was attacked by a fever in consequence 
of bathing in the cold water of the Cydnus. While sick he was informed that hi8 
physician Philip had been bribed by Darius to poison him. As Pbilip came into the 
room, Alexander handed him the letter containing the warning, and then, before the 
doctor could speak, swallowed the medicine. His confidence was rewarded by a 
speedy recovery. 



152 GREECE. [326 B.C. 

The mysterious East still alluring him on, Alexander, 
exploring, conquering,^ founding cities, at last reached the 
river Hyph'asis, where his army refused to proceed fiu*ther 
in the unknown regions. Instead of going directly back, 
he built vessels, and descended the Indus ; thence the fleet 
cruised along the coast, while the troops returned through 
Gedro'sia (Beloochistan), suffering fearful hardships in its 
inhospitable deserts.^ When he reached Babylon, ten years 
had elapsed since he crossed the Hellespont. 

The next season, while just setting out from Babylon 
upon a new expedition into Arabia, he died (323 b. c). 
With him perished his schemes and his empire. 

Alexander's Plan was to mold the diverse nations 
which he had conquered into one vast empire, with the 
capital at Babylon. Having been the Cyrus, he desired to 
be the Darius of the Persians. He sought to break down 
the distinctions between the Greek and the Persian. He 
married the Princess Roxana, the "Pearl of the East," 
and induced many of his army to take Persian wives. He 
enlisted twenty thousand Persians into the Macedonian 
phalanx, and appointed natives to high office. He wore the 
Eastern dress, and adopted oriental ceremonies in his court. 
He respected the rehgion and the government of the various 
countries, restrained the satraps, and ruled more beneficently 
than their own monarchs. 

The Results of the thirteen years of Alexander's reign 
have not yet disappeared. Great cities were founded by 

1 Porus, an Indian prince, held the banks of the Hydaspes with three hundred 
war-chariots and two hundred elephants. The Indians being defeated, Poms was 
brought into Alexander's presence. When asked what he wished, Porus replied, 
"Nothing except to be treated like a king." Alexander, struck by the answer, gave 
him his liberty, and enlarged his territory. 

2 One day while Alexander was parched with thirst, a drink of water was given 
him, but he threw it on the ground lest the sight of his pleasure should aggravate the 
suffering of his men. 



336-323 B.C.] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 



153 



him, or his generals, which are still marts of trade. Com- 
merce received new life. Greek culture and civilization 
spread over the Orient, and the Greek language became, if 
not the common speech, at least the medium of communi- 
cation among educated people from the Adriatic to the 
Indus. So it came about, that, when Greece had lost her 
national hberty, she suddenly attained, through her con- 
querors, a world-wide empire over the minds of men. 

But while Asia became thus Hellenized, the East exerted a 
reflex influence upon Hellas. As Rawlinson well remarks, — 

"The Oriental habits of servility and adulation superseded the old free-spoken 
independence and manliness; patriotism and public spirit disappeared; luxury 
increased ; literature lost its vigor ; art deteriorated ; and the people sank into a 
nation of pedants, parasites, and adventurers." 



ALEXANDER'S SUCCESSORS. 

Alexander's Principal Generals, soon after his 
death, divided his empire among themselves. A mortal 
struggle of twenty- two years followed, during which these 
offi-cers, released from the strong hand of their master, 
"fought, quarreled, grasped, and wrangled like loosened 
tigers in an amphitheater." The greed and jealousy of the 
generals, or kings as they were called, were equaled only 
by the treachery of their men. Finally, by the decisive battle 
of Ipsus (301 B. c), the conflict was ended, and the following 
distribution of the territory made : — 



Ptolemy 
received Egypt, and 
conquered all of 
Palestine, Phoenicia, 
and Cyprus. 



Lysim'aclius 
received Thrace and 
nearly all of Asia 
Minor. 



Seleueus 
received Syria and 
the East, and he af- 
terward conquered 
Asia Minor, Lysim- 
achus being slain. 



Cassander 
received Macedon 
and Greece. 



Ptolemy founded a flourishing Greek kingdom in Egypt. 
The Greeks, attracted by his benign rule, flocked thither in 



154 GREECE. [323 B.C. 

multitudes. The Egyptians were protected in their ancient 
religion, laws, and customs, so that these stiff-necked rebels 
against the Persian rule quietly submitted to the Macedonian. 
The Jews ^ in large numbers found safety under his paternal 
government. This threefold population gave to the second 
civilization which grew up on the banks of the Nile a pe- 
cuHarly cosmopolitan character. The statues of the Greek 
gods were mingled with those of Osiris and Isis ; the same 
hieroglyphic word was used to express a Greek and a lower 
Egyptian ; and even the Jews forgot the language of Pales- 
tine, and talked Greek. Alexandria thus became, under the 
Ptolemies, a brilliant center of commerce and civilization. 
The building of a commodious harbor and a superb light- 
house, and the opening of a canal to the Red Sea, gave a 
great impetus to the trade with Arabia and India. Grecian 
architects made Alexandria, with its temples, obelisks, 
palaces, and theaters, the most beautiful city of the times. 
Its white marble lighthouse, called the Pharos, was one of 
the Seven Wonders of the World (p. 601). At the center of 
the city, where its two grand avenues crossed each other, in 
the midst of gardens and fountains, stood the Mausoleum, 
which contained the body of Alexander, embalmed in the 
Egyptian manner. 

The Alexandrian Museum and Library founded by 
Ptolemy I. (Soter), but greatly extended by Ptolemy II. 
(Philadelphus), and enriched by Ptolemy III. -(Euergetes), 
were the grandest monuments of this Greco-Egyptian 
kingdom. The Library comprised at one time, in aU its 
collections, seven hundred thousand volumes. The Museum 
was a stately marble edifice surrounded by a portico, beneath 
which the philosophers walked and conversed. The pro- 

1 They had a temple at Alexandria similar to the one at Jerusalem, and for their 
use the Old Testament was translated into Greek (275-250 B. c). From the fact that 
seventy scholars performed this work, it is termed tlie Septuagint. 



323-222 B.C.] THE POLITICAL HISTORY, 155 

fessors and teachers were all kept at the public expense. 
There were connected with this institution a botanical and 
a zoological garden, an astronomical observatory, and a 
chemical laboratory. To this grand university resorted the 
scholars of the world (see Steele's New Astronomy, p. 9). 
At one time in its history there were in attendance as many 
as fourteen thousand persons. While wars shook Europe 
and Asia, Archimedes and Hero the philosophers, Apelles 
the painter, Hipparchus and Ptolemy the astronomers, Euclid 
the geometer, Eratosthenes and Strabo the geographers, 
Manetho the historian, Aristophanes the rhetorician, and 
Apollonius the poet, labored in quiet upon the peaceful 
banks of the Nile. Probably no other school of learning 
has ever exerted so wide an influence. When Caesar wished 
to revise the calendar, he sent for Sosigenes the Alexandrian. 
Even the early Christian church drew, from what the ancients 
loved to call " the divine school at Alexandria," some of its 
most eminent Fathers, as Origen and Athanasius. Modern 
science itself dates its rise from the study of nature that 
began under the shadow of the Pyramids. 

Last of the Ptolemies. — The first three Ptolemies were 
able rulers. Then came ten weak or corrupt successors. 
The last Ptolemy married his sister,^ the famous Cleopatra 
(p. 254), who shared his throne. At her death Egypt became 
a province of Rome (30 b. c). 

Seleucus was a conqueror, and his kingdom at one time 
stretched from the JEgean to India, comprising nearly all 
the former Persian empire. He was a famous founder of 
cities, nine of which were named for himself, and sixteen 
for his son Antiochus. One of the latter, Antioch in Syi'ia 
(Acts xi. 26, etc.), became the capital instead of Babylon. 
The descendants of Seleucus (Seleucidae) were unable to 

1 This kind of family intermarriage was common among the Pharaohs. 



156 GREECE. [65 B.C. 

retain his vast conquests, and one province after another 
dropped away, until the wide empire finally shrank into 
Syria, which was grasped by the Romans (65 b. c). 

Several Independent States arose in Asia during 
this eventful period. Pergamus became an independent 
kingdom on the death of Seleucus I. (280 B. c), and, mainly 
through the favor of Rome, absorbed Lydia, Phrygia, and 
other provinces. The city of Pergamus, with its school of 
literature and magnificent public buildings, rivaled the 
glories of Alexandria. The rapid growth of its library so 
aroused the jealousy of Ptolemy that he forbade the export 
of papjrrus ; whereupon Eumenes, king of Pergamus, resorted 
to parchment, which he used so extensively for ^Titing that 
this material took the name of pergamena. By the will 
of the last king of Pergamus, the kingdom fell to Rome 
(p. 237). Parthia arose about 255 b. c. It gradually spread, 
until at one time it stretched from the Indus to the Euphra- 
tes. Never absorbed into the Roman dominion, it remained 
throughout the palmy days of that empire its dreaded foe. 
The twenty-ninth of the Arsacidae, as its kings were called, 
was driven from the throne by Artaxerxes, a descendant of 
the ancient line of Persia, and, after an existence of about 
five centuries, the Parthian Empire came to an end. It was 
succeeded by the new Persian monarchy or kingdom of the 
Sassanidae (226-652 a. d.). Pontus, a rich kingdom of Asia 
Minor, became famous through the long wars its great king 
Mithridates V. carried on with Rome (p. 243). 

Greece and Macedonia, after Alexander's time, pre- 
sent little historic interest.^ The chief feature was that 
nearly aU the Grecian states, except Sparta, in order to make 

1 In 279 B. c. there was a fearful irruption of the Gauls under Brennus (see 
Brief Hist. France, p. 10). Greece was ravaged by the barbarians. They were finally 
expelled, and a remnant founded a province in Asia Minor named Galatia, to whose 
people in later times St. Paul directed one of his Epistles. 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 157 

head against Macedonia, formed leagues similar to that of 
our government during the Revolution. The principal ones 
were the Achcean and the ^tolian. But the old feuds and 
petty strifes continued until all were swallowed up in the 
world-wide dominion of Rome, 146 b. c. (p. 236). 

Athens under the Romans was prosperous. Other 
centers of learning existed, — Alexandria, Marseilles, Tarsus ; 
but scholars from all parts of the extended empire of 
Rome still flocked to Athens to complete their education. 
True, war had laid waste the groves of Plato and the garden 
in which Epicurus lived, yet the charm of old associations 
continued to linger around these sacred places, and the 
Four Schools of Philosophy (p. 175) maintained their hold 
on public thought.^ The Emperor Hadrian (p, 261) estab- 
lished a Library, and built a pantheon and a gymnasium. 
The Antonines endowed university professorships. So late 
as the close of the 4th century a. d. a writer describes the airs 
put on by those who thought themselves " demigods^ so proud 
are they of having looked on the Academy and Lyceum, 
and the Porch where Zeno reasoned." But with the fall 
of Paganism and the growth of legal studies — so peculiar to 
the Roman character — Athens lost her importance, and her 
schools were closed by Justinian (529 a. d.). 

1 It is strange to hear Cicero, in De Finibus, speak of these scenes as already classic 
ground : " After hearing Antiochus in the Ptolemaeam, with Piso and my brother 
and Pomponiiis, ... we agreed to take our evening walk in the Academy. So we all 
met at Piso's house, and, chatting as we went, walked the six stadia between the Gate 
Dipylum and the Academy. When we reached the scenes so justly famous, we 
found the quietude we craved. ' Is it a natural sentiment,' asked Piso, *or a mere 
illusion, which makes us more affected when we see the spots frequented by men 
worth remembering than when we merely hear their deeds or read their works? It 
is thus that I feel touched at present, for I think of Plato, who, as we are told, was 
wont to lecture here. Not only do those gardens of his, close by, remind me of him, 
but I seem to fancy him before my eyes. Here stood Speusippus, here Xenocrates, 
here his hearer Poleraon.' . . . ' Yes,' said Quintus, ' what you say, Piso, is quite 
true, tor as I was coming hither, Colonus, yonder, called my thoughts away, and made 
me fancy that I saw its inmate Sophocles, for whom you know my passionate admi- 
ration.'— 'And I, too,' said Pomponius, 'whom you often attack for my devotion to 
Epicurus, spend much time in his garden, which we passed lately in our walk.' " 



158 



GREECE. 



2. THE CIVILIZATION. 

"Athens is the school of Greece, and the Athenian is best fitted, by diversity of 
gifts, for the graceful performance of all life's duties."— PericZes. 

Athens and Sparta. — Thongli the Greeks comprised many 
distinct tribes, inhabiting separate cities, countries, and islands, 
having different laws, dialects, manners, and customs, Athens and 
Sparta were the great centers of Hellenic life. These two cities 
differed widely from each other in thought, habits, and tastes. 
Sparta had no part in Grecian art or literature. " There was no 
Spartan sculptor, no Laconian painter, no Lacedaemonian poet." 
From Athens, on the contrary, came the world's masterpieces in 
poetry, oratory, sculpture, and architecture. 




GREEK GALLEY WITH THREE BANKS OF OARS. 



Society. — The Athenians boasted that they were Autochthons,"^ 
i. e., sprung from the soil where they lived; and that their descent 
was direct from the sons of the gods. The ancient Attic tribes were 
divided into phratries, or fraternities ; the phratries into gentes, or 
clans ; and the gentes into hearths, or families. The four tribes 
were bound together by the common worship of Apollo Patrous, 
reputed father of their common ancestor, Ion. Each phratry had 
its particular sacred rites and civil compact, but all the phratries 
of the same tribe joined periodically in certain ceremonies. Each 
gens had also its own ancestral hero or god, its exclusive privilege 

1 In recognition of this belief, they wore in their hair, as an ornament, a golden 
grasshopper,— an insect hatched from eggs laid in the ground. 



THE CIVILIZATION. 159 

of priesthood, its compact of protection and defense, and its spe- 
cial burial-place. Last of all, every family had its private worship 
and exclusive ancestral rites. Thus their religion both unified and 
separated the Greeks ; while the association of houses and brother- 
hoods powerfully influenced their early social and pohtical life. 

Athens in her golden days had, as we have already seen, neither 
king" nor aristocracy. Every free citizen possessed a voice in the 
general government, and zealously maintained his rights and 
liberty as a member of the state. Although to belong to an old and 
noble house gave a certain position among all true-born Athenians, 
there was little of the usual exclusiveness attending great wealth or 
long pedigree. An Athenian might be forced from poverty to wear 
an old and tattered cloak, or be only the son of a humble image- 
maker, as was Socrates, or of a cutler, as was Demosthenes, yet, if 
he had wit, bravery, and talent, he was as welcome to the brilliant 
private saloons of Athens as were the richest and noblest 

Trade and Merchandise were as unpopular in most parts of 
Greece as in Persia. The Greeks regarded arms, agriculture, 
music, and gymnastics as the only occupations worthy a freeman. 
To profit by retail trade was esteemed a sort of cheating, and 
handicrafts were despised because they tied men down to work, 
and gave no leisure for athletic exercises or social culture. In 
Sparta, where even agriculture was despised and all property was 
held in common, an artisan had neither public influence nor 
political rights; while in Thebes no one who had sold in the 
market within ten years was allowed part in the government. 
Even in democratic Athens, where extensive interests in ship- 
building and navigation produced a strong sentiment in favor 
of commerce, the poor man who lived on less than ten cents a 
day, earned by serving on juries^ or in other public capacities, 
looked with disdain on the practical mechanic and tradesman. 
Consequently most of the Athenian stores and shops belonged to 

1 Tliere were ten courts in Athens, employing, when all were open, six thousand 
jurymen. The Athenians had such a passion for hearing and deciding judicial and 
political questions, that they clamored tor seats in the jury-box. Greek literature 
abounds with satires on this national peculiarity. In one of Lucian s dialogues, 
Menippus is represented as looking down from the moon and watching the chaiacter- 
istic pursuits of men. "The northern hordes were fighting, the Egyptians were 
plowing, the Phoenicians were carrying their merchandise over the sea, the Spartans 
were whipping their children, and the Athenians were sitting in the jury-box." So 
also Aristophanes, in liis satire called The Clouds, has his hero (Strepsiades) visit the 
School of Socrates, where he is shown a map of the world. 

Student. — "And here lies Athens." 

Strep.— "Athens ! nay, go to That cannot be. I see no laio courts sitting!" 



160 



Gr Iv £] £] G Ej • 



aliens, who paid heavy taxes and made large profits. Solon sought 
to encourage manufacturing industries, and engaged in com- 
merce, for which he traveled ; Aristotle kept a druggist's shop 
in Atnens ; and even Plato, who shared the national prejudice 
against artisans, speculated in oil during his Egyptian tour. 

Sparta, with her two kings, powerful ephors, and landed aris- 
tocracy, presents a marked contrast to Athens. 

The Two Kings were supposed to have descended by different 
lines from the gods, and this belief preserved to them what little 
authority they retained under the supremacy of the ephors. They 
offered the monthly sacrifices to the gods, consulted the Delphian 
oracle, which always upheld their dignity, and had nominal com- 
mand of the army. On the other hand, war and its details were 
decided by the ephors, two of whom accompanied one king on the 
march. The kings were obliged monthly to bind themselves by 
an oath not to exceed the laws, the ephors also swearing on that 
condition to uphold the royal authority. In case of default, the 
kings were tried and severely fined, or had their houses burned. 

The population of Laconia, as we have seen, comprised Spar- 
tans, perioeki, and helots (p. 119). 

The Spartans lived in the city, and were 
the only persons eligible to public office. So 
long as they submitted to the prescribed 
discipline and paid their quota to the public 
mess, they were Equals. Those who were 
unable to pay their assessment lost their 
franchise, and were called Inferiors; but by 
meeting their public obligation they could 
at any time regain their privileges. 

The Periceki were native freemen. They in- 
habited the hundred townships of Laconia, 
having some liberty of local management, 
but subject always to orders from Sparta, 
the ephors having power to inflict the death 
penalty upon them without form of trial. 

The Helot was a serf bound to the soil, and 
belonged not so much to the master as to the 
state. He was the pariah of the land. If he 
dared to wear a Spartan bonnet, or even to 
sing a Spartan song, he was put to death. The old Egyptian 
kings thinned the ranks of their surplus rabble by that merciless 




GKECIAN PEASANT. 



THE CIVILIZATION. 161 

system of forced labor whicli produced the pyramids j the Spar- 
tans did not put the blood of their helots to such useful account, 
but, when they became too powerful, used simply the knife and the 
dagger.^ The helot served in war as a light-armed soldier attached 
to a Spartan or perioekian hoplite.^ Sometimes he was clothed in 
heavy armor, and was given freedom for superior bravery. But 
a freed helot was by no means equal to a pericekus, and his 
known courage made him more than ever a man to be watched. 

Literature. — In considering Egyptian, Assyrian, Babylonian, 
and Persian literature, we have had only fragments, possessing 
little value for the present age except as historical curiosities, or 
as a means of insight into the life and attainments of the people. 
Grecian literature, on the contrary, exists to-day as a model. 
From it poets continue to draw their highest inspiration ; its first 
great historian is still known as the "Father of History;" its 
philosophy seems to touch every phase of thought and argument 
of which the human mind is capable j and its oratory has never 
been surpassed. So vast a subject should be studied by itself, 
and in this book we can merely furnish a nucleus about which the 
pupil may gather in his future reading the rich stores which 
await his industry. For convenience we shall classify it under 
the several heads of Poetry, History, Oratory, and Philosophy. 

Poetry. — Epics (Narrative Poems). — The earliest Grecian litera- 
ture of which we have any knowledge is in verse. In the dawn of 
Hellas, hymns of praise to the gods were performed in choral dances 
about shrines and altars, and heroic legends woven into ballads 
were musically chanted to the sound of a four- stringed lyre. 
With this rhythmical story -telling, the Rhapsodists {ode-stitchers) 
used to delight the listening multitudes on festive occasions in 

1 The helots were once free Greeks like their masters, whom they hated so bitterly 
that there was a saying, " A helot could eat a Spartan raw." They wore a sheep-skin 
garment and dog-skin cap as the contemptuous badge of their slavery. There was 
constant danger of revolt, and from time to time the bravest of them were secretly 
killed by a band of detectives appointed by the government for that purpose. Some- 
times a wholesale assassination was deemed necessary. During tlie Peloponnesian 
war the helota had shown so much gallantry in battle, that the Spartan authorities 
were alarmed. A notice was issued that two thousand of the bravest— selected by 
their fellows— should be made free. There was great rejoicing among the deluded 
slaves, and the happy candidates, garlanded with flowers, were marched proudly 
through the streets and around the temples of the gods. Then they mysteriously 
disappeared, and were never heard of more. At the same time seven hundred other 
helots were sent off to join the army, and the Spartans congratulated themselves on 
having done a wise and prudent deed. 

2 A hoplite was a heavy-armed infantryman. At Platiea every Spartan had seven 
helots, and every pericekus one helot to attend him. 



162 



GREECE. 



princely halls, at Ampliictyonic gatherings, and at religious as- 
semblies. Among this troop of wandering minstrels there arose 
, Homer i (about 1000 B.C.), 




an 



Asiatic Greek, whose 



name has become immortal. 
The Iliad and Odyssey are 
the grandest epics ever writ- 
ten. The first contains the 
story of the Siege of Troy 
(p. 115); the second narrates 
the wanderings of Ulysses, 
king of Ithaca, on his return 
from the Trojan Conquest. 
Homer's style is simple, ar- 
tistic, clear, and vivid. It 
abounds in sublime descrip- 
tion, delicate pathos, pure 
domestic sentiment, and no- 
ble conceptions of character. His verse strangely stirred the Gre- 
cian heart. The rhapsodist Ion describes the emotion it produced : 

" When that which I recite is pathetic, my eyes fill with tears ; when it is awfnl 
or terrible, my hair stands on end, and my heart leaps. The spectators also weep in 
sympathy, and look aghast with terror." 

Antiquity paid divine honors to Homer's name; the cities of 
Greece owned state copies of his works, which not even the treas- 
uries of kings could buy j and his poems were then, as now, the 
standard classics in a literary education (p. 179). 



HOMER. 



1 According to tradition, Homer was a schoolmaster, who, wearying of confine- 
ment, began to travel. Having become blind In the conrse of his wanderings, he re- 
turned to his native town, where he composed his two great poems. Afterward he 
roamed from town to town, singing his lays, and adding to them as his inspiration 
came. Somewhere on the coast of the Levant he died and was buried. His birth- 
place is unknown, and, according to an old Greek epigram, 
" Seven rival towns contend for Homer dead. 
Through which the living Homer begged his bread." 
Many learned writers have doubted whether Homer ever existed, and regard the two 
great poems ascribed to him as a simple collection of heroic legends, recited by differ- 
ent bards, and finally woven into a continuous tale. The three oldest manuscripts 
we have of the Iliad came from Egypt, the last having been found under the head of a 
mummy excavated in 1887 at Hawara, in the Fayoom. Some critics assert that tlie 
story of the Siege of Troy is allegorical, a repetition of old Egyptian fancies, " founded 
on the daily siege of the east by tlie solar powers that everj^ evening are robbed of 
their brightest treasures in the west." Dr. Schliemann, a Geinuin explorer, un- 
earthed (1872-82) in Asia Minor what is believed to be the Homeric Ilium. His dis- 
coveries are said to refute all skepticism as to the historic reality of the Siege of Troy. 



THE CIVILIZATION. 163 

Hesiod, wlio lived after the time of Homer, wrote two long 
poems, '' Works and Days " ^ and " Theogony." In the former he 
details his agricultural experiences, enriching them with fable, 
allegory, and moral reflections, and also furnishes a calendar of 
lucky and unlucky days for the use of farmers and sailors ; the 
latter gives an account of the origin and history of the thirty 
thousand Grecian gods, and the creation of the world. The Spar- 
tans, who despised agriculture, called Hesiod the ''poet of the 
helots," in contrast with Homer, " the deUght of warriors." In 
Athens, however, his genius was recognized, and his poems took 
their place with Homer's in the school education of the day. 

After Homer and Hesiod the poetic fire in Greece slumbered for 
over two hundred years. Then arose many lyric, elegiac, and 
epigrammatic poets, whose works exist only in fragments. 

Tyrtceus, "the lame old schoolmaster," invented the trumpet, 
and gained the triumph for Sparta ^ in the Second Messenian War 
by his impassioned battle-songs. 

Archil' ochus^ was a satirical poet of great reputation among 
the ancients. His birthday was celebrated in one grand festival 
with that of Homer, and a single double-faced statue X3erpetuated 
their memory. He invented many rhythmical forms, and wrote 
with force and elegance. His satire was so venomous that he is 
said to have driven a whole family to suicide by his pen, used in 

1 The Works and Days was an earnest appeal to Hesiorl's dissipated brother, 
whom he styles the "simple, foolish, good-t'or-uaught Perses." It abounds with 
arguments for honest industry, gives numerous suggestions on the general conduct 
of society, and occasionally dilates on the vanity, frivolity, and gossip, which the 
author imputes to womankind. 

2 The story is that, in obedience to an oracle, the Spartans sent to Athens for a 
general who should insure them success. The jealous Athenians ironically answered 
their demand with the deformed Tyrtseus. Contrary to their design, the cripple poet 
proved to be just what was needed, and his wise advice and stirring war-hymns 
spurred the Spartans on to victory. 

3 One of the greatest of soldier poets, Archilochus proved himself a coward on 
the battle-field, afterward proclaiming the fact in a kind of apologetic bravado, 
thus: 

"The foeman glories o'er my shield, 
J left it on the battle-field. 
I threw it down beside the wood, 
Unscathed by scars, unstained with blood 
And let him glory ; since from death 
Escaped, I keep my forfeit breath. 
I soon may find at little cost 
As good a shield as tliat I lost." 

When he afterward visited Sparta, the authorities, taking a different view of shield- 
dropping, ordered him to leave the city iu an hour. 



364 GREECE. 

revenge for his rejection by one of the daughters. He likened 
himself to a porcupine bristling with quills, and declared, 

" One great thing I know, 
The man who wrongs me to requite with woe." 

Sappho, " the Lesbian Nightingale," who sang of love, was put 
by Aristotle in the same rank with Homer and Archilochus. Plato 
called her the tenth muse, and it is asserted that Solon, on hearing 
one of her poems, prayed the gods that he might not die till he had 
found time to learn it by heart. Sappho's style was intense, bril- 
liant, and full of beautiful imagery; her language was said to 
have a *' marvelous suavity." She sought to elevate her country- 
women, and drew around her a circle of gifted poetesses whose 
fame spread with hers throughout Greece. 

AlccBus, an unsuccessful lover of Sappho, was a polished, pas- 
sionate lyrist. His pohtical and war poems gained him high 
repute, but, like Archilochus, he dropped his shield in battle and 
ran from danger. His convivial songs were favorites with the clas- 
sic topers. One of his best poems is the famihar one, beginning, 

" What constitutes a state ? 
Not high-raised battlement or labored mound. 
Thick wall or moated gate." 

Anacreon, a courtier of Hipparchus (p. 123), was a "society 
poet." Himself pleasure-loving and dissipated, his odes were 
devoted to " the muse, good humor, love, and wine." He lived 
to be eighty-five years old, and his memory was perpetuated on 
the Acropohs at Athens by a statue of a drunken old man. 

Simonides was remarkable for his terse epigrams and choral 
hymns. He was the author of the famous inscription upon the 
pillar at Thermopylae (p. 132), of which Christopher North says, 

" 'Tis but two lines, and all Greece for centuries had them by heart. She forgot 
them, and Greece was living Greece no more." 

Pindar, the " Theban Eagle," came from a long ancestry of poets 
and musicians. His fame began when he was twenty years old, 
and for sixty years he was the glory of his countrymen (p. 151). 
As Homer was the poet, and Sappho the poetess, so Pindar was the 
lyrist, of Greece. Of all his compositions, there remain entire only 
forty-five Triumphal Odes celebrating victories gained at the 
national games. His bold and majestic style abounds in striking 
metaphors, abrupt transitions, and complicated rhythms. 

The Drama.— Rise of Tragedy and Comedy. — In early times 
the wine-god Dionysus ( Bacchus) was worshiped with hymns and 



THE CIVILIZATION. 165 

dances around an open altar, a goat being the usual sacrifice. i 
During the Bacchic festivities, bands of revelers went about with 
their faces smeared with wine lees, shouting coarse and bantering 
songs to amuse the village-folk. Out of these rites and revels grew 
tragedy (goat-song) and comedy (village-song). The themes of the 
Tragic Chorus were the crimes, woes, and vengeance of the "fate- 
driven " heroes and gods, the murderous deeds being commonly 
enacted behind a curtain, or narrated by messengers. The great 
Greek poets esteemed fame above everything else, and to write for 
money was considered a degradation of genius. The prizes for 
which they so eagerly contended were simple crowns of wild olives. 

j^schylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, the great tragic trio of 
antiquity, belong to the golden Age of Pericles. The first ex- 
celled in the sublime, the second in the beautiful, and the third 
in the pathetic. 2 

^schylus (525-456 b. c.) belonged to a noble family in Eleusis, a 
village near Athens famous for its secret rites of Demeter (p. 184). 
Here, under the shadow of the sacred mysteries, a proud, earnest 
boy, he drank in from childhood a love of the awful and sublime. 
A true soldier poet, he did not, like Archilochus and AIcsdus, vent 
all his courage in words, but won a prize for his bravery at Marathon, 
and shared in the glory of Salamis. In his old age he was publicly 
accused of sacrilege for having disclosed on the stage some details 

1 Grecian m5'^tliolosy represented Bacchus as a merry, rollicking god, whose 
attendants were fauns and satyrs,— beings half goat and half man. The early Tragic 
Chorus dressed in goat-skins. Thespis, a strolling i)layer, introduced an actor or 
story-teller between the hymns of his satyr-chorus to fill up the pauses with a nar 
rative. ^scliylus added a second, and Sophocles a third actor; more tlian that never 
appeared together on the Athenian stage. Women were not allowed to act. A poet 
contesting for the prize generally offered three plays to be produced the same day in 
succession on the stage. This was called a trilogy ; a farce or satyr-drama often 
followed, closing the series. 

2 <' Oh, our ^schylus, the thunderous ! 
How he drove the bolted breath 
Through the cloud, to wedge it ponderous 
In the gnarled oak beneath. 

" Oh, our Sophocles, the royal, 

Who was born to monarch's place, 

And who made the whole world loyal 

Less by kingly power than grace. 

" Our Euripides, the human. 

With his droppings of warm tears. 
And his touches of things common 
Till they rose to touch tlie spheres." 

Mrs. Browning, in " Wine of Cyprus." 



166 



GREECE. 



of the Eleusinian mysteries. Becoming piqued at the rising success 
of Sophocles, who bore a prize away from him, he retired to Syra- 
cuse, where, at the court of Hiero, with Pindar, Simonides, and 
other hterary friends, he passed his last years, ^schylus wrote 
over seventy tragedies, of which only seven are preserved. 






^schylus, 




" THE GREAT TRAGIC TKIO." 



"Prometheus Bound " is perhaps his finest tragedy. In the old myth, Prometheus 
steals fire from heaven to give to man. For this crime Zeus sentences him to be 
hound upon Mount Caucasus, where for thirty thousand years an eagle sliould feed 
upon his vitals. Thetaunts and scoffs of the hrutal sheriffs, " Strength " and " Force," 
who drag him to the spot; the reluctant riveting of his chains and bolts by the sj'-m- 
pathiziiig Vulcan ; the graceful pity of the ocean-nymphs who come to condole with 
him ; the threats and expostulations of Mercury, who is sent by Zeus to force from 
the fettered god a secret he is withholding ; the unflinching defiance of Prometheus, 
and the final opening of the dreadful abyss into which, amid fearful thunders, light 
nings, and " gusts of all fierce winds," the rock and its sturdy prisoner drop suddenly 
and are swallowed up,— all these are portrayed in this drama with a force, majesty, 
and passion which in the whole range of literature is scarcely equaled. 

From Prometheus Bovm\— {Prometheus to Mercury.) 

" Let the locks of the lightning, all bristling and whitening, 

Flash, coiling me round. 
While the ether goes surging 'neath thunder and scourging 

Of wild winds unbound ! 
Let the blast of the firmament whirl from its place 

The earth rooted below, 
And the brine of the ocean, in rapid emotion. 

Be it driven in the face 
Of the stars up in heaven, as they walk to and fro ! 
Let him hnrl me anon into Tartarus— on— 

To the blackest degree, . . . 
But he cannot join death to a fate meant for me." 

Mrs. Browning's Translation 



THE CIVILIZATION. 167 

Sophocles (495-406 b. c), the sweetness and purity of whose style 
gained for him the title of the Attic Bee, was only twenty-seven 
years old when he won the prize away from ^schylus, then ap- 
proaching sixty, -^schylus had been a gallant soldier ', Sophocles 
was a polished gentleman. Less grand and impetuous, more 
graceful and artistic, than his great competitor, he came like sun- 
shine after storm. The tragedies with which the elder poet had 
thrilled the Athenian heart were tinctured with the unearthly 
mysteries of his Eleusinian home ; the polished creations of Sopho- 
cles reflected the gentle charm of his native Colo'nus, — a beautiful 
hill-village i near Athens, containing a sacred grove and temple. 
Sophocles improved the style of the Tragic Chorus, and attired 
his actors in ''splendid robes, jeweled chaplets, and embroidered 
girdles." Of him, as of -^Eschylus, we have only seven tragedies 
remaining, though he is said to have composed over one hundred. 

"CEdipus tlie Kii)g" was selected by Aristotle as tlie masterpiece of tragedy. 
CEdipus, so runs the plot, was son of Laius, king of Tliebes. An oi acle having fore- 
told that he should "slay his father and marry his mother," Jocasta, the queen, 
exposes him to die in the forest. A shepherd rescues him. He grows up unconscious 
of his story, and journeys to Thebes. On the way he meets an old man, whose chariot 
jostles him. A quarrel ensues, and lie slays the gray-haired stranger. Arrived at 
Thebes, he finds the whole city in commotion. A frightful monster, called the 
Sphinx, has propounded a ilddle which no one can solve, and eveiy failure costs a 
lite. So terrible is the crisis that the hand of the widowed queen Is offered to any one 
who will guess the riddle and so save the state. CEdipus guesses it, and weds Jocasta, 
his mother. After many years come fearful pestilences, which the oracle declares 
shall continue until the murderer of Laius Is found and punished. The unconscious 
CEdipus pushes the search, and is confronted with the revelation of his unhappy 
destiny. Jocasta hangs herself in horror ; CEdipus tears a golden buckle from her 
dress, thrusts its sharp point into both his eyes, and goes out to roam the earth. 

In " QEdipus at Colonus" the blind old man, attended by his faithful daughter 
Antig'one, has wandered to Colonus, where he sits down to rest within the precincts 
of the sacred grove. The indignant citizens, discovering who the old man Is, command 
him to depart from their borders. Meantime war is raging in Thebes between his 
two sons, and an oracle declares that only his body will decide success. Everynieans 
is used to obtain it, but the gods have willed that his sons shall slay eacli other. 
CEdipus, always " driven by fate," follows the Queen of Night, upon whose borders 
he has trespassed. The last moment comes ; a sound of subterranean thunder is 
heard ; his daughters, wailing and terrified, cling to him in wild embrace ; a mys- 
terious voice calls from beneath, "CEdipus! King CEdipus! come hither; thou art 
wanted ! " The earth opens, and the old man disappears forever. 

1 Here, two years before the fall of Athens (p. 145), he closed his long, prosperous, 
luxurious life. "We can imagine Sophocles in his old age recouniing the historic 
names and scenes with which he had been so familiar ; how he had listened to the 
thunder of ' Olympian Pericles ; ' how he had been startled by the chorus of Furies in 
the play of ^schylus ; how he had talked with the garrulous and open-hearted 
Herodotus; how he had followed Anaxagoras, the great skeptic, in the cool of the 
day among a throng of his disciples ; how he had walked witli Phidias and supped with 
Aspasia."— ColMws. 



168 GREECE. 

The following is from a famous chorus in " CEdipus at Colonus," describing the 
beauties of the poet's home :— 

" Here ever aud aye, through the greenest vale, 
Gush the wailing notes of the nightingale, 
From her home where tlie dark-hued ivy weaves 
With the grove of the god a night of leaves ; 
And the vines blossom out from the lonely glade. 
And the suns of the summer ai'e dim in the shade, 
Aud the storms of the winter have never a breeze 
That can shiver a leaf from the charmed trees. 



And wandering there forever, the fountains are at play, 

And Cephissus feeds his river from their sweet urns, day by day ; 

The river knows no dearth ; 

Adown the vale the lapsing waters glide. 

And the pure rain of that pel acid tide 

Calls the rife beauty from the heart of earth." 

Bulwer's Translation. 

Euripides ^ (480-406 b. c), the " Scenic Philosopher/' was born in 
Salamis on the day of the great sea-fight.^ Twenty-five years after- 
ward—the year after ^schylus died — his first trilogy was put upon 
the stage. Athens had changed in the half-century since the poet 
of Eleusis came before the public. A new element was steadily 
gaining ground. Doubts, reasonings, and disbeliefs in the marvel- 
ous stories told of the gods were creeping into society. Schools of 
rhetoric and philosophy were springing up, and already 'Ho use 
discourse of reason" was accounted more important than to recite 
the Iliad and Odyssey entire. To ^schylus and to most of his 
hearers the Fates and the Furies had been dread realities, and the 
gods upon Olympus as undoubted personages as Miltiades or The- 
mistocles; Sophocles, too, serenely accepted all the Homeric deities; 
but Euripides belonged to the party of '^ advanced thinkers," and 

1 Fragments of Antiope, one of the lost plays of Euripides, have recently come to 
liglit in a curious manner. At Gurob, in the Egyptian Fayoom, Prof. Petrie thought 
he detected writing on some of the papyrus scraps that were sttick together to form 
the papier-mache mummy-cases. Among these fragments, after they had been care- 
fully separated, cleansed, and deciphered, were found portions of Plato's Phredo, and 
three pages of Antiope. The writing belongs to a period almost contemporary with 
Plato and Euripides themselves. Thus, in some of these Egyptian nuunniy-cases, 
made up of old waste paper, may yet be found the very autographs of the great mas- 
ters of Greek literature. " If a bit of Euripides has leaped to light, why not some 
of the lost plays of ^.schylus and Sophocles, or some songs of Sappho? " (For inter- 
esting account, see Biblia, September, 1891.) 

2 The three great tragic poets of Athens were singularly connected by the battle 
of Salamis. ^schykis, in the heroic vigor of Ids life, fought there; Euripides, 
whose parents had fled from Athens on the approach of tlie Persians, was born near 
the scene, probably on the battle-day ; and Sopliocles, a beautiful boy of fifteen, 
danced to the choral song of Simonides, celebrating the victory. 



THE CIVILIZATION. 169 

believed no more in the gods of the myths and legends than in the 
prophets and soothsayers of his own time. Discarding the ideal 
heroes and heroines of Sophocles, he modeled his characters after 
real men and women, endowing them with human passions and 
aifections.i Of his eighty or ninety plays, seventeen remain. 

" Mede'a" is bis most celebrated tragedy. A Colchian princess skilled in sorcery 
becomes the wife of Jason, the hero of the Golden Fleece. Being afterward thrust 
aside for a new love, she finds lier revenge by sending the bride an enchanted robe 
and crown, in wliich she is no sooner clothed than they burst into flame and con- 
sume her. To complete her vengeance, Medea murders her two young sons,— so deeply 
wronged by their father, so tendei-ly loved by herself,— and then, after hovering over 
the palace long enough to mock and jeer at the anguish of the frantic Jason, she is 
whirled away with the dead bodies of her children in a dragon-borne car, the chariot 
of her grandsire, the sun. 

From Mkde a.— (Medea to her sons.) 
" Why gaze you at me with your eyes, my children ? 
Why smile your last sweet smile 1 Ah me ! ah me ! 
What shall I do? My heart dissolves within me, 
Friends, when I see the glad ej'es of my sons ! 
Yet whence this weakness? Do I wish to reap 
The scorn that springs from enemies unpunished? 
Die they must ; tliis must be, and since it must, 
I, I myself will slay them, I who bore them. 

O my sons ! 
Give, give your mother your dear hands to kiss. 
O dearest hands, and mouths most dear to me, 
And forms and noble f^ces of my sons ! 
O tender touch and sweet breath of my boys ! " 

Symonds's Translation. 

Comedy. — When Aristophanes appeared with the first of his 
sharp satires, Enripides had been for a quarter of a century before 
the public, and the Peloponnesian war was near at hand. The new 
poet whose genius was so full of mockery and mirth was a rich, 
aristocratic Athenian, the natural enemy of the ultra-democratic 
mob-orators of his day, whom he heartily hated and despised. In 
the bold and brilliant satires which now electrified all Athens, 

1 Aristophanes ridiculed his scenic art, denounced his theology, and accused him 
of corrupting society by the falsehood and deceit shown by his characters. The line 
in one of his plays, 

" Though the tongue swore, the heart remained unsworn," 
caused his arrest for seeming to justify perjury. When the people were violent in 
censure, Euripides would sometimes appear on the stage and beg them to sit the 
play through. On one occasion, when their displeasure was extreme, he tartly ex- 
claimed, " Good people, it is my business to teach you, and not to be taught by you." 
Tradition relates that he was torn to pieces by dogs, set upon him by two rival poets, 
"While he was walking in the garden of the Macedonian king, at Pella. The Athenians 
were eager to honor him after his death, and erected a statue in the theater where he 
had been so often hissed as well as applauded. 



170 GREECE. 

every prominent public man was liable to see his personal pecu- 
liarities paraded on the stage.i The facts and follies of the times 
were pictured so vividly, that when Dionysius, the Tyrant of Syra- 
cuse, wrote to Plato for information as to affairs in Athens, the 
great philosopher sent for answer a copy of " The Clouds." 

Aristophanes wrote over fifty plays, of which eleven, in part or 
all, remain. 

Of these, "The Frogs" and the "Woman's Festival" were direct satires on Eu- 
ripides, "The Knights" was written, so the author declared, to "cut up Cleon the 
Tanner into slioe leather." 2 "The Clouds" ridiculed the new-school philosophers, 3 
and " The Wasps," the Athenian passion for law-courts. 

From the Clouds.— (-Scene ; Socrates, absorbed in thought, swinging in a basket, 
surrounded by his students. Enter Strepsiades, a visitor.) 

Str. Who hangs dangling in yonder basket? 

STUD. HIMSELF. STK. And who's Himself? STUD. Why, Socrates. 

Str. Ho, Socrates! Sweet, darling Socrates ! 

SOC. Why callest thou me, poor creature of a day? 

Str. First tell me, pray, what are you doing up there 1 

Soc. I walk in air and contemplate the sun ! 

Str. Oh, that 's the way that you despise tlie gods— 

You get so near them on your perch there— eh ? 
Soc. I never could have found out tilings divine. 

Had I not hung my mind up thus, and mixed 

My subtle intellect with its kindred air. 

Had I regarded such things from below, 

I had learnt nothing. For the earth absorbs 

Into itself the moisture of the brain. 

It is the same with water-cresses. 
STR. Dear me ! So water-cresses grow by thinking ! 

The so-called Old Comedy, in which individuals were satirized, 
died with Aristophanes; and to it succeeded the Neio Comedy, por- 
traying general types of human nature, and dealing with domes- 
tic life and manners. 

Menander {342-291 B.C.), founder of this new school, was a 

1 Even the deities were burlesqued, and the devout Athenians, who denounced 
Euripides for venturing to doubt the gods and goddesses, were wild in applause wJieu 
Aristophanes dragged them out as absurd cowards, or blustering braggarts, or as 

" Baking peck-loaves and f rj'ing stacks of pancakes." 

2 The masks of the actors in Greek comedy were made to caricature the features 
of the persons represented. Cleon was at this time so powerful that no artist dared 
to make a mask for his character in the play, nor could any man be found bold 
enough to act the part, Aristophanes, therefore, took it himself, smearing his face 
with wine lees, which he declared " well represented the purple and bloated visage of 
the demagogue." 

3 It is said that Socrates, who was burlesqued in this play, was present at its per- 
formance, wliich he heait ily enjoyed ; and that he even mounted on a bencli, tliat every 
one might see the adiuirable resemblance between himself and his counterfeit upon 
the stage. 



THE CIVILIZATION. 



171 



warm friend of Epicurus (p. 177), whose philosophy he adopted. 
He admired, as heartily as Aristophanes had disliked, Euripides, 
and his style was manifestly influenced by that of the tragic poet. 
He excelled in delineation of character, and made his dramatic 
personages so real, that a century afterward it was written of him, 

" O Life, and O Menander ! Speak and say 
Which copied which? Or Nature, or the play? " 

Of his works only snatches remain, many of which were household proverbs 
among the Greeks and Romans. Such were: " He is well cleansed that hath his con- 
science clean," "The workman is greater than his work," and the memorable one 
quoted by St. Paul, " Evil communications corrupt good manners." 






Ml 




THE GREAT HISTORIANS OF GREECE. 

History. — Here is another illustrious trio: Herodotus (484-420), 
Thucydides (471-400), and Xenophon (about 445-355). Herodotus^ 
^'Father of History," we recall as an old friend met in Egyptian 
study (p. 15). Having rank, wealth, and a passion for travel, he 
roamed over Egypt, Phoenicia, Babylon, Judea, and Persia, study- 
ing their history, geography, and national customs. In Athens, 
where he spent several years, he was the intimate friend of Sopho- 
cles. His history was divided into nine books, named after the nine 
Muses.i The principal subject is the Greek and Persian war ; but, 
by way of episode, sketches of various nations are introduced. 
His style is artless, graphic, flowing, rich in description, and inter- 

1 Leonidas of Tarentum, a favorite writer of epigrams, wlio lived two hundred 
years after Herodotus, thus accounted for their names: — 

" The Muses nine came one day to Herodotus and dined, 
And in return, their host to pay, left each a book behind," 



172 GREECE. 

spersed with, dialogue. He has been described as having '* the head 
of a sage, the heart of a mother, and the simplicity of a child." 

Thucydides is said to have been won to his vocation by hearing 
the history of Herodotus read at Olympia, which charmed him to 
tears. E-ich, noble, and educated, he was in the prime of his man- 
hood, when, at the opening of the Peloponnesian war, he received 
command of a squadron. Having failed to arrive with his ships 
in time to save a certain town from surrender, Cleon caused his 
disgrace, and he went into exile to escape a death penalty. Dur- 
ing the next twenty years he prepared his "History of the Pelo- 
ponnesian war." His style is terse, noble, and spii'ited ; as an 
historian he is accurate, philosophic, and impartial. "His book," 
says Macaulay, "is that of a man and a statesman, and in this 
respect presents a remarkable contrast to the delightful childish- 
ness of Herodotus." 

Xenophon'^s historical fame rests mostly on his Anabasis,^ which 
relates the expedition of Cyrus and the Retreat of the Ten Thou- 
sand. He was one of the generals who conducted this memorable 
retreat, in which he displayed great firmness, courage, and military 
skill. A few years later the Athenians formed their alliance with 
Persia ; and Xenophon, who still held command under his friend and 
patron, the Spartan king Agesilaus, was brought into the position 
of an enemy to his state. Having been banished from Athens, 
his Spartan friends gave him a beautiful country residence near 
Olympia, where he spent the best years of his long life. Next to 
the Anabasis ranks his Memorabilia (memoirs) of Socrates,^ his 
friend and teacher. Xenophon was said by the ancients to be "the 
first man that ever took notes of conversation." The Memo- 
rabilia is a collection of these notes, in which the character and 
doctrines of Socrates are discussed. XeUophon was the author 
of fifteen works, all of which are extant. His style, simple, clear, 
racy, refined, and noted for colloquial vigor, is considered the 
model of classical Greek prose. 

Oratory. — Eloquence was studied in Greece as an art. Pericles, 

1 This word means the " march up," viz., from tlie sea to Babylon. A more ap- 
propriate name wouhl he Katahasis (march down), as most of the hook is occupied 
with the details of the return journey. 

2 There is a story that Xenophon, when a boy, once met Socrates in a lane. 
The philosopher, barring tlie way with his cane, demanded, " Where Is food 
sold?" Xenophon having replied, Socrates asked, "And where are men made 
good and noble?" Tlie lad hesitated, whereupon Socrates answered himself by 
saying, " Follow me, and learn." Xenophon obeyed, and was henceforth his devoted 
disciple. 



THE CIVILIZATION. 



173 




DEMOSIHENES. 



though he spoke only upon great occasions, Isoc'rates, and ^s'- 
chines were all famed for powers of address, but 

Demosthenes (385-322 b. c.) 
was the unrivaled orator of 
Greece, if not of the world. 
An awkward, sickly, stam- 
mering boy, by his deter- 
mined energy and persever- 
ance he ''placed himself at 
the head of all the mighty 
masters of speech — unap- 
proachable forever" {Lord 
Brougham). His first address 
before the public assembly was 
hissed and derided j but he 
was resolved to be an orator, 
and nothing daunted him. He 
used every means to overcome 

his natural defects, ^ and at last was rewarded by the palm of 
eloquence. He did not aim at display, but made every sentence 
subservient to his argument. " We never think of his words," 
said Fenelon ; " we think only of the things he says." His oration 
''Upon the Crown" 2 is his masterpiece. 

Philosophy and Science.— The Seven Sages (Appendix), 
Cleobu'lus, Chi'lo, Perian'der, Pit'tacus, Solon, Bias, and Thales, 
lived about 600 b. c.^ They were celebrated for their moral, 
social, and political wisdom. 

1 That he might study without hindrance, he shut himself up for months in a 
room under ground, and, it is said, copied the History of Thucydides eight times, that 
he might be infused with its concentrated thought and energy. Out on the seashore, 
with his mouth filled with pebbles, he exercised his voice until it sounded full and 
clear above the tumult of tlie waves; while in the privacy of his own room, before 
a full-length mirror, he disciplined his awkward gestures till he had schooled them 
into grace and aptness. 

2 It had been proposed that his public services should be rewarded by a golden 
crown, the custom being for an orator to wear a crown in token of his inviolability 
while speaking, ^schines, a fellow-orator, whom he had accused of favoring Philip, 
opposed the measure. The discussion lasted six years. When the two finally appeared 
before a vast and excited assembly for the closing argument, the impetuous eloquence 
of Demosthenes swept everything before it. In after years, though his whole life had 
proved him a zealous patriot, he was charged with having received bribes from 
Macedon. Exiled, and under sentence of death, he poisoned himself. 

3 About this time lived JEsop, who, though born a slave, gained his freedom and 
the friendship of kings and wise men by his peculiar wit. His fables, long preserved 
by oral tradition, were the delight of the Athenians, who read in them many a pithy 



174 GREECE. 

Tholes founded a school of thinkers. He taught that all things 
were generated from water, into which they would all be ulti- 
mately resolved. 

During the two following centuries many philosophers 
arose . — 

Anaximan'der, the scientist, invented a sun-dial, — an instrument 
which had long been used in Egypt and Babylonia, — and wrote a 
geographical treatise, enriched with the first known map. 

Anaxag'oras discovered the cause of eclipses, and the difference 
between the planets and fixed stars. He did not, like his prede- 
cessors, regard fire, air, or water as the origin of all things, but 
believed in a Supreme Intellect. He was accused of atheism,! 
tried, and condemned to death, but his friend Pericles succeeded 
in changing the sentence to exile. Contemporary with him was 

Hippoc' rates, the father of physicians, v*'ho came from a family of 
priests devoted to ^sculapius, the god of medicine. He wrote 
many works on physiology, and referred diseases to natural causes, 
and not, as was the popular belief, to the displeasure of the gods. 

Pytliag'oras, the greatest of early philosophers, was the first to 
assert the movement of the earth in the heavens j he also made 
some important discoveries in geology and mathematics. At his 
school in Crotona, Italy, his disciples were initiated with secret 
rites ; one of the tests of fitness being the power to keep silence 
under every circumstance. He based all creation upon the numer- 
ical rules of harmony, and asserted that the heavenly spheres roll 
in musical rhythm. Teaching the Egyptian doctrine of transmi- 
gration, he professed to remember what had happened to himself 
in a previous existence when he was a Trojan hero. His fol- 
lowers reverenced him as half divine, and their unquestioning 
faith passed into the proverb. Ipse dixit (He has said it). 

Sod rates (470-399 B. c). — During the entire thirty years of the 
Peloponnesian war a grotesque-featured, ungainly, shabbily 
dressed, barefooted man might have been seen wandering the 
streets of Athens, in all weathers and at all hours, in the crowded 
market place, among the workshops, wherever men were gathered, 
incessantly asking and answering questions. This was Socrates, 

public lesson. His statue, the work of Lysippus (p. 183), was placed opposite to those 
of the Seven Sages in Athens. Socrates greatly admired ^sop's Fables, and during 
Ids last days in prison amused himself by versifying them. 

1 The Greeks were especially angry because Anaxagoras taught that the sun is 
not a god. It is a curious fact that they condemned to death as an atheist the first 
man among tlietn who advanced the idea of One Supreme Deity. 



THE CIVILIZATION. 175 

a self-taught philosopher, who believed that he had a special mis- 
sion from the gods, and was attended by a " divine voice " which 
counseled and directed him. The questions he discussed pertained 
to life and morality, and were especially pointed against Sophists, 
who were the skeptics and quibblers of the day.i His earnest elo- 
quence attracted all classes,^ and among his friends were Alci- 
biades, Euripides, and Aristophanes. A man who, by his irony 
and argument, was continually " driving men to their wits' end," 
naturally made enemies. One morning there appeared in the 
portico where such notices were usually displayed the following 
indictment : '' Socrates is guilty of crime ; first, for not worshiping 
the gods whom the city worships, but introducing new divinities 
of his own ; secondly, for corrupting the youth. The penalty due 
is death." Having been tried and convicted, he was sentenced to 
drink a cup of the poison-hemlock, which he took in his prison 
chamber, surrounded by friends, with whom he cheerfully con- 
versed till the last. Socrates taught the unity of God, the immor- 
tality of the soul, the beauty and necessity of virtue, and the moral 
responsibility of man. He was a devout believer in oracles, which 
he often consulted. He left no writings, but his philosophy has 
been preserved by his faithful followers, Xenophon and Plato. 

The Four Great Schools of Philosophy (4th century B.C.). — 
1. The Academic school was founded by that devoted disciple 
of Socrates, Plato (429-347), who delivered his lectures in the 
Academic Gardens. Plato ^ is perhaps best known from his argu- 

1 Their belief that "what I think is true is true; what seems right ts right," 
colored state policy and individual action in the Peloponnesian war, and was respon- 
sible for much of its cruelty and baseness. The skeptic Pyrrlio used to say : " It may 
be so, perhaps ; I assert nothing, not even that I assert." Socrates taught his pupils 
by a series of logical questions whicli stimulated thought, cleared perception, and 
created in the learner a real hunger for knowledge. The " Socratic Method " of teach- 
ing is still in use. When addressed to braggarts and pretenders, the apparently 
innocent "Questions" of Socrates were a terror and a confusion. 

2 " Gradually the crowd gathered round him. At first he spoke of the tanners, and 
the smiths, and the drovers, who were plying their trades about him ; and they shouted 
with laughter as he poured forth his homely jokes. But soon the magic charm of his 
voice made itself felt. The peculiar sweetness of its tone had an effect which even 
the thunder of Pericles failed to produce. The laughter ceased— the crowd thick- 
ened—the gay youth, whom nothing else could tame, stood transfixed and awe- 
struck . . . —the head swam— the heart leaped at the sound — tears rushed from 
their eyes, and they felt that, unless they tore themselves away from that fascinated 
circle, they should sit down at his feet and grow old in listening to the marvelous 
music of this second Marsyas." 

3 The Greeks had no family or clan names, a single appellation serving for an 
individual. To save confusion the father's name was frequently added. Attic wit 



176 GREECE. 

ments in regard to the immortality of the soul. He believed in one 
eternal God, without whose aid no man can attain wisdom or vir- 
tue, and in a previous as well as a future existence. All earthly- 
knowledge, he averred, is but the recollection of ideas gained by 
the soul in its former disembodied state, and as the body is only 
a hindrance to perfect communion with the " eternal essences," 
it follows that death is to be desired rather than feared. His 
works are written in dialogue, Socrates being represented as the 
principal speaker. The abstruse topics of which he treats are en- 
livened by wit, fancy, humor, and picturesque illustration. His 
style was considered so perfect that an ancient writer exclaimed, 
" If Jupiter had spoken Greek, he would have spoken it. like 
Plato." The fashionables of Athens thronged to the Academic 
Gardens to hsten to " the sweet speech of the master, melodious as 
the song of the cicadas in the trees above his head." Even the 
Athenian women — shut out by custom from the intellectual 
groves — shared in the universal eagerness, and, disguised in male 
attire, stole in to hear the famous Plato. 

2. The Peripatetic school was founded by Aristotle (384-322), 
who delivered his lectures while walking up and down the shady 
porches of the Lyceum, surrounded by his pupils (hence called 
Peripatetics, walkers). An enthusiastic student under Plato, he 
remained at the academy until his master's death. A few years 
afterward he accepted the invitation of Philip of Macedon to be- 
come instructor to the young Alexander. Returning to Athens in 
335 B. c.,he brought the magnificent scientific collections given him 
by his royal patron, and opened his school in the Lyceum Gym- 
nasium. Suspected of partisanship with Macedon, and accused of 
impiety, to avoid the fate of Socrates he fled to Euboea, where he 
died. Aristotle, more than any other philosopher, originated ideas 
whose influence is still felt. The ^' Father of Logic," the princi- 
ples he laid down in this study have never been superseded. His 
books include works on metaphysics, psychology, zoology, ethics, 
politics, and rhetoric. His style is intricate and abstruse. He 
differed much from Plato, and, though he recognized an infinite, 
immaterial God, doubted the existence of a future life. 

supplied abundant nicknames, suggested by some personal peculiarities or cir- 
cumstance. Thus this philosopher, whose real name was Aiis'tocles, was called 
Plato because of his broad brow. He was descended on his father's side from 
Codrus, the last hero-king .of Attica, and on his mother's from Solon ; but his ad- 
mirers made him a son of the god Apollo, and told how in liis infancy the bees had 
settled on his lips as a prophecy of the honeyed words which were to fall from them. 



THE CIVILIZATION. 177 

3. The Epicureans were the followers of Epicu'rus (340-270), 
who taught that the chief end of life is enjoyment. Himself strict- 
ly moral, he lauded virtue as a road to happiness, but his fol- 
lowers so perverted this that ^^ Epicurean" became a synonym for 
loose and luxurious hving. — The Cynics {kunikos, dog-like) went 
to the other extreme, and, despising pleasure, gloried in pain and 
privation. They scoffed at social courtesies and family ties. The 
sect was founded by Antisthenes, a disciple of Socrates, but its 
chief exponent was Diogenes, who, it is said, ate and slept in a tub 
which he carried about on his head.^ 

4. The Stoics were headed by Zeno (355-260), and took their 
name from the painted portico {stoa) under which he taught. Pain 
and pleasure were equally despised by them, and indifference to aU 
external conditions was considered the highest virtue. For his 
example of integrity, Zeno was decreed a golden chaplet and a 
public tomb in the Ceramicus. 

Grecian philosophy culminated in Neo-Platonism, a mixture of 
Paganism, mysticism, and Hebrew ethics, which exalted revela- 
tions and miracles, and gave to reason a subordinate place. In 
Alexandria it had a fierce struggle with Christianity, and died 
with its last great teacher, the beautiful and gifted Hypatia, who 
was killed by a mob. 

Later Greek Writers.— Plutarch (50-120 a.d.) was the great- 
est of ancient biographers. His '' Parallel Lives of Greeks and 
Eomans " still delights hosts of readers by its admirable portrait- 
ure of celebrated men. Lucian (120-200 a.d.), in witty dialogues, 
ridiculed the absurdities of Greek mythology and the follies of 
false philosophers. His '^Sale of the Philosophers" humorously 
pictures the founders of the different schools as auctioned off by 
Mercury. 

Libraries and Writing Materials. — Few collections of books 
were made before the Peloponnesian war, but in later times it be- 
came fashionable to have private libraries,^ and after the days of 

1 He was noterl for his caustic wit and rude manners Tradition says that Alex- 
ander the Great once visited him as he was seated in his tub, basking in the sun. " I 
am Alexander," said the monarch, astonished at the Indifference with which he was 
received. " And I am Diogenes," returned the cynic. " Have you no favor to ask of 
mel" inquired the king. " Yes," growled Diogenes, " to get out of my sunligM." He 
was vain of his disregard for social decencies. At a sumptuous banquet given by 
Plato he entered uninvited, and, rubbing his soiled feet on the rich carpets, cried out, 
"Thus I trample on your pride, O Plato!" The polite host, who knew his visitor's 
weakness, aptly retorted, " But with still greater pride, O Diogenes ! " 

2 Aristotle had an immense library, wbich was sold after his death. Large 



178 



O BEi EiCG • 



the tragic poets Athens not only abounded in book-stalls, but a 
place m the Agora was formally assigned to book-auctioneering. 
Manuscript copies were rapidly multiplied by means of slave 
labor, and became a regular article of export to the colonies. 
The Egyptian papyrus, and afterward the fine but expensive 
parchment, were used in copying books; the papyrus was writ- 
ten on only one side, the parchment on both sides.^ 

The reed pen was used as in Egypt, 
and double inkstands for black and 
red ink were invented, having a ring 
by which to fasten them to the girdle 
of the writer. Waxed tablets were 
employed for letters, note-books, and 
other requirements of daily life. These 
were written upon with a metal or 
ivory pencil {stylus), pointed at one 
end and broadly flattened at the 
other, so that in case of mistake the 
writing could be smoothed out and 
the tablet made as good as new. A 
large burnisher was sometimes used 
for the latter purpose. Several tab- 
lets joined together formed a book. 

Education. — A Greek father held the lives of his young children 
at his will, and the casting-out of infants to the chances of fate 
was authorized by law throughout Greece, except at Thebes. Girls 
were especially subject to this unnatural treatment. If a child 
were rescued, it became the property of its finder. 

The Athenian Boy of good family was sent to school when seven 
years old, the school-hours being from sunrise to sunset. Until he 
was sixteen he was attended in his walks by a pedagogue,— n^M^Wy 




A GREEK TABLET. 



collections of books have been found in the remains of Pompeii and Herculaneiim. 
Some of these volumes, although nearly reduced to coal, have by great care been 
unrolled, and have been published. 

1 The width of the manuscript (varying from six to fourteen inches) formed the 
length of the page, the size of the roll depending upon the number of pages in a 
book. When finished, the roll was coiled around a stick, and a ticket containing the 
title was appended to it. Documents were sealed by tying a string around them and 
affixing to the knot a bit of clay or wax, which was afterward stamped with a seal. 
In libraries the books were arranged in pigeon-holes or on shelves with the ends out- 
ward ; sometimes several scrolls were put together in a cylindrical box with a cover. 
The reader unrolled the scroll as he advanced, rolling up the completed pages with 
his other hand (see illustration, p. 279). 



THE CIVILIZATION, 



179 



some trusty, intelligent slave, too old for hard work,— who 
never entered the study room, no visitors, except near relatives 
of the master, being allowed therein on penalty of death. The boy 
was first taught grammar, arithmetic, and writing. His chief books 
were Hesiod and Homer, which he committed to memory. The 
moral lessons they contained were made prominent, for, says Plato, 
" Greek parents are more careful about the manner 
and habits of the youth than about his letters and 
music." Discipline was enforced with the rod. All 
the great lyric poems were set to music, which was 
universally taught. "Rhythms and harmonies," 
again says Plato, "are made famihar to the souls 
of the young, that they may become more gentle, 
and better men in speech and action." Symmet- 
rical muscular development was considered so im- 
portant that the young Athenian between sixteen 
and eighteen years of age spent most of his time 
in gymnastic exercises. During this period of pro- 
bation the youth's behavior was carefully noted by 
his elders. At eighteen he was ceremoniously 
enrolled in the hst of citizens. Two years were 
now given to public service, after which he was 
free to follow his own inclinations. If he were 
scholarly disposed, and had money and leisure,i 
he might spend his whole life in learning. 

The httle an Athenian girl was required to know was learned 
from her mother and nurses at home. 

The Spartan Lad of seven years was placed under the control of 
the state. Henceforth he ate his coarse hard bread and black broth 
at the public table, 2 and slept in the public dormitory. Here he 




A GRECIAN YOUTH. 



1 Our worrl " school " is derived from the Greek word for leisure. The education 
of the Greeks was obtained not so much from books as from the philosophical lec- 
tures, the public assembly, the theater, and the law courts, where much of their time 
was spent (p. 159). 

2 The public mess was so compulsory, that when, on his return from vanquishing 
the Athenians, King Agis ventured to send for his commons, that he might take his 
first meal at home with his wife, he was refused. The principal dish at the mess- 
table was a black broth, made from a traditional recipe. Wine mixed with water 
was drunk, but toasts were never given, for the Spartans thousrht it a sin to use 
two words when one would do. Intoxication and the Symposium (p. 199) were 
forbidden by law. Fat men were regarded with suspicion. Small boys sat on low 
stools near their fathers at meals, and were given half rations, which they ate in 
silence. 



180 



GREECE. 



was taught to disdain all liome affections as a weakness, and to 
think of himself as belonging only to Sparta. He was brought up 
to despise not only softness and luxury, but hunger, thirst, torture, 
and death. Always kept on small rations of food, he was some- 
times allowed only what he could steal. If he escaped detection, 
his adroitness was applauded ; if he were caught in the act, he 
was severely flogged j but though he were whipped to death, he 
must neither wince nor groan. ^ 




BAST END OF THE PARTHENON (AS RESTORED BY FERGUSSON). 

Monuments and Art.— The three styles of Grecian architecture 
^Doric, Ionic, and Corinthian— are distinguished by the shape of 
their columns (see cut, p. 182). 

The Bone was originally borrowed from Egypt (p. 40); the 
Parthenon at Athens, and the Temple of Zeus at Olympia, were 
among its most celebrated examples. The Parthenon, or House 
of the Maiden, situated on the Acropohs, was sacred to Pallas 

1 The Spartan lad had a model set before him. It was that of a hoy who stole a 
fox and hid it under his short cloak He mnst have been somewhat awkward,-no 
donht the Spartan children were warned against this fault in his morals,-for he was 
suspected, and ordered to he flogged till he confessed W^hile the lashes fell, the fox 
struggled to escape. The boy, with his quivering back raw anrt bieeoing and his 
breast torn by savage claws and teeth, stood sturdily, and flinched not. At last the 
desperate fox readied his heart, and he dropped dead-but a hero' 



THE CIVILIZATION. 181 

Athena, the patron goddess of Attica. It was built throughout 
of fine marble from the quarry of Mount Pentelicus, near Athens, 
its ghsteuing whiteness being here and there subdued by colors 
and gilding. The magnificent sculptures^ which adorned it were 
designed by Phidias,— that inimitable artist whom Pliny desig- 
nates as " before all, Phidias, the Athenian." The statue of the 
virgin goddess, within the temple, was forty feet high ; her 
face, neck, arms, hands, and feet were ivory 5 her drapery was 
pure gold.2 The temple at Olympia was built of porous stone, 
the roof being tiled with Pentelic marble. It stood on the banks 
of the Alpheus, in a sacred grove (Altis) of plane and olive trees. 
Not to have seen the Olympian statue of Zeus, by Phidias, was 
considered a calamity. ^ 

The most celebrated Ionic temple was that of Artemis (Diana) 
at Ephesus, which was three times destroyed by fire, and as often 
rebuilt with increased magnificence. 

Corinthian architecture was not generally used in Greece before 
the age of Alexander the Great. * The most beautiful example is 
the Choragic Monument of Lysicrates (pp. 188, 194), in Athens. 

1 These sculptures, illustrating events in the mythical life of the goddess, are 
among the finest in existence. Some of them were sent to England by Lord P^lgin 
when he was British ambassador to Turkey, and are now in the British Museum, 
where, with various other sculptures from the Athenian Acropolis, all more or less 
mutilated, they are known as the Elgin Marbles. 

2 The Greeks accused Phidias of having purloined some of the gold provided him 
lor this purpose ; but as, by the advice of his shrewd friend Pericles, he had so at- 
tached the metal that it could be removed, he was able to disprove the charge. He 
was afterward accused of impiety for having placed the portraits of Pericles and him- 
self in the group upon Athena's shield. He died in prison. 

3 The statue, sixty feet high, was seated on an elaborately sculptured throne of 
cedar, inlaid with gold, ivory, ebony, and precious stones ; like the statue of Athent: 
in the Parthenon, the face, feet, and body were of ivory; the eyes, were brilliant 
jewels, and the hair and beard pure gold. The drapery was beaten gold, enameled 
with flowers. Due hand grasped a scepter composed of precious metals, and sur- 
mounted by an eagle; in the other, like Athena, he held a golden statue of Nike (the 
winged goddess of victory). The statue was so high in proportion to the building, 
that the Greeks used to say, "If the god should rise, he would burst open the roof." 
The effect of its size, as Phidias had calculated, was to impress the beholder with 
the pent-up majesty of the greatest of gods. A copy of tlie head of this statue is 
in the Vatican. The statue itself, i-emoved by Theodosius I. to Constantinople, was 
lost in the disastrous fire (A. D. 475) which destroyed the Library in that city. At 
the same time perished the Venus of Cnidus, by Praxiteles (p. 183), which the an- 
cients ranked next to the Phidian Zeus and Athena. 

■* The invention of the Corinthian capital is ascribed to Callimachus, who, seeing 
a small basket covered with a tile placed in the center of an acanthus plant which 
grew on the grave of a young lady of Corinth, was so struck with its beauty that he 
executed a capital in imitation of it.— Westropp'B Hand-book of Arehitecturt. 



182 



GREECE. 



The Propylaea, or entrance to the Athenian Acropolis, was a 
magnificent structure, which opened upon a group of temples, 
altars, and statues of surpassing beauty. All the splendor of 
Grecian art was concentrated on the state edifices, private archi- 
tectural display being forbidden by law. After the Macedonian 
conquest, dwellings grew luxurious, and Demosthenes rebukes 
certain citizens for living in houses finer than the public buildings. 




Doric. 



louic. 
THREE ORDERS OF GRECIAN ARCHITECTURE. 



CoriDthian. 



(1, shaft; 2, capital; 3, architrave; 4, frieze; 5, cornice. T7ie entire part above the 
capital is the entablature. At the bottom of the shaft is the base, which rests upon 
the pedestal.) 

The Athenian Agora (market place), the fashionable morning 
resort, was surroimded with porticoes, one of which was decorated 
with paintings of glorious Grecian achievements. Within the 
inclosure were gi'ouped temples, altars, and statues. 

Not one ancient Greek edifice remains in a perfect state. 

Paintings were usually on wood ; wall-painting was a separate 
and inferior art. The most noted painters were ApoUodorus of 
Athens, sometimes called the Greek Rembrandt ; Zeuxis and Par- 
rhasius, who contended for the prize— Parrhasius producing a 
picture representing a curtain, which his rival himself mistook for 
a real hanging, and Zeuxis offering a picture of grapes, which de- 
ceived even the birds ; Apelles, the most renowned of all Greek 
artists, who painted with four colors, blended with a varnish 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 183 

of his own invention ; his friend Protogenes, the careful painter, 
sculptor, and writer on art; Nicias, who, having refused a sum 
equal to seventy thousand dollars from Ptolemy I. for his master- 
piece, bequeathed it to Athens; and Pausias, who excelled in 
wall-painting, and in delineating children, animals, flowers, and 
arabesques. The Greeks tinted the background and bas-reliefs 
of their sculptures, and even painted their inimitable statues, 
gilding the hair, and inserting glass or silver eyes. 

In marble and bronze statuary, and in graceful vase-painting^ 
the Greeks have never been surpassed. All the arts and orna- 
mentation which we have seen in use among the previous nations 
were greatly improved upon by the Greeks, who added to other 
excellences an exquisite sense of beauty and a power of ideal ex- 
pression peculiar to themselves. Besides Phidias, whose statues 
were distinguished for grandeur and sublimity, eminent among 
sculptors were Praxiteles, who excelled in tender grace and finish ; 
Scopas, who delighted in marble allegory ; and Lysippus, a worker 
in bronze, and the master of portraiture.^ 

3. THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 

Eeligion and Mythology. — Nothing marks more strongly the 
poetic imagination of the Greeks than the character of their religious 
worship. They learned their creed in a poem, and told it in marble 
sculpture. To them nature overflowed with deities. Every grove 
had its presiding genius, every stream and fountain its protecting 
nymph. Earth and air were filled with invisible spirits, and the sky 
was crowded with translated heroes, — their own half-divine ancestors. 
Their gods were intense personalities, endowed with human passions 
and instincts, and bound by domestic relations. Such deities appealed 
to the hearts of their worshipers, and the Greeks loved their favorite 
gods with the same fervor bestowed upon their earthly friends. On the 
summit of Mount Olympus, in Thessaly, beyond impenetrable mists, 
according to their mythology, the twelve 2 great gods held council. 

1 The masterpieces of Praxiteles were an undraped Venus sold to the people 
of Cnidus, and a satyr or faun, of which the best antique copy is preserved in the 
Capitoline Museum, Rome. This statue suggested Hawtliorne's charming romance, 
The Marble Faun. The celebrated Niobe Group in the Uffizi Gallery, Floience, is the 
work of either Praxiteles or Scopas. The latter was one of the artists employed on 
the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus (Appendix). Lysippus and A pelles were favorites 
of Alexander the Great, who would allow only them to carve or paint liis image. 

2 They were called the Twelve Gods, but the lists vary, increasing the actual 
number. Roman mythology was founded on Greek, and, as tlie Latin names are now 
in general use, they have been interpolated to assist the puiJil's association. 



184 GREECE. 

Zeus (Jove or Jupiter) was supreme. He ruled with the thunderbolts, and was 
king over gods and men. His symbols were the eagle and the lightning, both asso- 
ciated with great height. His two brothers, 

Poseidon (Neptune) and Hades ( Pluto) held sway respectively over the sea and the 
depths under ground. As god of the sea, Poseidon had the dolphin for his symbol; 
as god over rivers, lakes, and springs, his symbols were the trident and the horse. 
Hades had a helmet which conferred invisibility upon the wearer. It was in much 
demand among the gods, and was his symbol. The shades of Hades, wherein the 
dead were received, were guarded by a three-headed dog, Cerberus. 

Hera (Juno), the haughty wife of Zeus, was Queen of the Skies. Her jealousy 
was the source of much discord in celestial circles. The stars were her eyes. Her 
symbols were the cuckoo and the peacock. 

Demeter (Ceres) was the bestower of bountiful harvests. Her worship was con- 
nected with the peculiarly sacred Eleusinian mysteries, whose secret rites have never 
been disclosed. Some think that ideas of the unity of God and the immortality of 
the soul were kept alive and handed down by them. Demeter's symbols were ears 
of corn, the pomegranate, and a car drawn by winged serpents. 

Hestia (Vesta) was goddess of the domestic hearth. At her altar in every house 
were celebrated all important family events, even to the purchase of a new slave, 
or the undertaking of a short journey. The family slaves joined in this domestic 
worship, and Hestia's altar was an asylum whither they might tlee tr» escape punish- 
ment, and where the stranger, even an euemy, could find protection. She was the 
persomficatiou of purity, and her sj'mbol was an altar-flame. 

Hephcestus (Vulcan) was the god of volcanic fires and skilled metal-work. Being 
lame and deformed, his parents, Zeus and Hera, threw him out of Olympus, but his 
genius finally brought about a reconciliation. Mount Etna was his forge, whence 
Prometheus stole the sacied fire to give to man. His brother. 

Ares (Mars) was god of war. His symbols were the dog and the vulture. 

Athena (Minerva) sprang full-armed from the imperial head of Zeus. She was the 
goddess of wisdom and of celestial wars, and the especial defender of citadels. 
Athena and Poseidon contested on the Athenian Acropolis for the supremacy over 
Attica. The one who gave the greatest boon to man was to win. Poseidon with his 
trident brought forth a spring of water from the barren rock; but Athena produced 
an olive-tree, and was declared victor. As a war-goddess she was called Pallas 
Athene. Her symbol was the owl. 

Aphrodite (Venus) was goddess of love and beauty. She arose from the foam of 
the sea. In a contest of personal beauty between Hera, Athena, and Aphrodite, 
Paris decided for Aphrodite. She is often represented with a golden apple in her 
hand, the prize offered by Eris (strife), who originated the dispute. Her symbol was 
the dove. 

Apollon (Apollo), the ideal of manly beauty, was the god of poetry and song, fie 
led the Muses, and in this character his symbol was a lyre ; as god of the fierce rays 
of the sun, which was his chariot, his symbol was a bow with arrows. 

Artemis (Diana), twin-sister to Apollo, was goddess of the chase, and protector 
of the water-nymplis. All young girls were under her care. The moon was her 
chariot, and her symbol was a deer, or a bow with arrows. 

Hermes (Mercury) w as the god of cunning and eloquence. In the former capacity 
he was associated with mists, and accused of thieving. The winged-footed messen- 
ger of the gods, he was also the guide of souls to the realms of Hades, and of heroes 
in difficult expeditions. As god of persuasive speech and success in trade he was 
popular in Athens, where he was worshiped at the street-crossings. i His symbol 
was a cock or a ram. 



1 The " Hermes " placed at street-corners was a stone pillar, surmounted by a 
buman head (p. 143). 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 



185 



Dionysus (Bacchus), god ol wine, with his wife Ariadne, ruled the fruit season. 

JHebe was a cup-bearer in Olympus. 

There was a host of minor deities and personifications, often appearing in a 
group of three, such as the Three Graces,— heautiful women, who represented the 
brightness, color, and perfume of summer ; the Three Fates,— stern sisters, upon 
whose spindle was spun the thread of every human life; the Three Hesperides,- 
daugliters of Atlas (upon whose shoulders the sky rested), in whose western garden 
golden apples grew ; the Three Harpies,— mischievous meddlers, who personated the 
effects of violent winds ; Three Gorgons, whose terrible faces turned to stone all who 
beheld them ; and Three Furies, whose mission was to pursue criminals. 

There were nine Muses, daughters of Zeus and Mnemosyne (Memory), who dwelt 
on Mount Parnassus, and held all gifts of inspiration : Clio presided over history; 
Melpomene, tragedy; Thalia, comedy; Calliope, epic poetry; Urania, astronomy; 
Euterpe, music ; Polyhymnia, song and oratory ; Erato, love-songs ; and Terpsichore, 
dancing. 




PRESENTING OFFERINGS AT THE TEMPLE OF DELPHI. 



Divination of all kinds was universal. Upon signs, dreams, and 
portents depended all the weighty decisions of life. Birds, especially 
crows and ravens, were watched as direct messengers from the gods, 
and so much meaning was attached to their voices, habits, manner of 
flight, and mode of alighting, that even in Homer's time the word "bird" 
was synonymous with " omen." The omens obtained by sacrifices were 
still more anxiously regarded. Upon the motions of the flame, the 
appearance of the ashes, and, above all, the shape and aspect of the 
victim's liver, hung such momentous human interests, that, as at 
Platasa, a great army was sometimes kept waiting for days till success 
should be assured through a sacrificial calf or chicken. 

Oracles. — The temples of Zens at Dodona (Epinis), and of Apollo at 
Delphi (Phocis), were the oldest and most venerated prophetic shrines. 
At Dodona three priestesses presided, to whom the gods spoke in the 



186 GREECE. 

rustling leaves of a sacred oak, aud the murmurs of a holy rill. But 
the favorite oracular god was Apollo, who, besides the Pythian temple 
at Delphi, had shrines in various parts of the land.i The Greeks had 
implicit faith in the Oracles, and consulted them for every important 
undertaking. 

Priests and Priestesses shared in the reverence paid to the gods. 
Their temple duties were mainly prayer and sacrifice. They occu- 
pied the place of honor in the public festivities, aud were supported 
by the temple revenues. 

Grecian religion included in its observances nearly the whole range 
of social pleasures. WorshijD consisted of songs and dances, proces- 
sions, libations, festivals, dramatic and athletic contests, and various 
sacrifices and purifications. The people generally were content with 
their gods and time-honored mythology, and left all difficult moral and 
religious problems to be settled by the philosophers and the serious- 
minded minority who followed them. 

BeliffioHS Games and Festivals. — The Olympian Games were held 
once in four years in honor of Zeus, at Olympia. Here the Greeks 
gathered from all parts of the country, protected by a safe transit 
through^hostile Hellenic states. The commencement of the Festival 
month having been formally announced by heralds sent to every state, 
a solemn truce supj^ressed all quarrels until its close. The competitive 
exercises consisted of running, leaping, wrestling, boxing, and chariot- 
racing. The prize was a wreath from the sacred olive-tree in Olympia. 
The celebration, at first confined to one day, came in time to last 
five days. Booths were scattered about the Altis (p. 181), where a gay 
traffic was carried on ; while in the spacious council-room the ardent 
Greeks crowded to hear the newest works of poets, philosophers, and 
historians. All this excitement and enthusiasm were heightened by 
the belief that the pleasure enjoyed was an act of true religious \vorsh'ip. 
The Pythian Games, sacred to Apollo, occurred near Delphi, in the 
third year of each Olympiad, and in national dignity ranked next to 
the Olympic. The prize-wreath was laurel. The Kemean and the 
Isthmian Games, sacred respectively to Zeus and Poseidon, were held 
once in two years, and, like the Pythian, had prizes for music and 
poetry, as well as gymnastics, chariots, and horses. The Nemean 

J A volcanic site, having a fissure through which gas escaped, was usually 
selected. The Delphian priestess, having spent thiee days in fasting and batliing, 
seated herself on a tripod over the chasm, where, under the real or imaginary effect 
of the vapors, she uttered her prophecies. Her ravings were recorded by the attend- 
ing prophet, and afterward turned into hexameter verse by poets hired for the pur- 
pose. The shrewd priests, through their secret agents, kept well posted on all matters 
likely to be urged, and when tlieir knowledge failed, as iti predictions for the future, 
made the responses so ambiguous or uniutelligible tliat they would seem to be verified 
by any result. 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 187 

crown was of parsley, the Isthmian of pine. Sparta took interest 
only in the Olympic games, with which she had been connected from 
their beginning, and which, it is curious to note, were the only ones 
having no intellectual competition. Otherwise, Sparta had her own 
festivals, from which strangers were excluded. 

TJie Panathence'a,^ which took place once in four years at Athens, 
in honor of the patron goddess, consisted of similar exercises, termi- 
nating in a grand procession in which the whole Athenian population 
took part. Citizens in full military equipment ; the victorious con- 
testants with splendid chariots and horses; priests and attendants 
leading the sacrificial victims ; dignified elders bearing olive-boughs ; 
young men with valuable, artistic plate; and maidens, the purest 
and most beautiful in Athens, with baskets of holy utensils on their 
heads, — all contributed to the magnificent display. Matrons from the 
neighboring tribes carried oak-branches, while their daughters bore 
the chairs and sunshades of the Athenian maidens. In the center of 
the procession was a ship resting on wheels, having for a sail a richly 
embroidered mantle or peploSy portraying the victories of Zeus and 
Athena, wrought and woven by Attic maidens. The procession, having 
gone through all the principal streets round to the Acropolis, marched 
up through its magnificent Propylaea, past the majestic Parthenon, and 
at last reached the Erechtheion, or Temple of Athena Polias (p. 194) 
Here all arms were laid aside, and, amid the blaze of burnt-offerings 
and the ringing pseans of praise, the votive gifts were placed in the 
sanctuary of the goddess. 

Tlie Feast of Diomjsns was celebrated twice during the spring 
season, the chief festival continuing for eight days. At this time 
those tragedies and comedies which had been selected by the archon — 
to whom all plays were first submitted — were brought out in the 
Dionysiac Theater 2 at Athens, in competition for prizes. 

1 The Panathenaic Procession formed the subject of the sculpture on the frieze 
around the Parthenon cella, in which stood the goddess sculptured by Phidias. Most 
of this frieze, much mutilated, is with tlie Elgin Marbles. 

2 This theater was built on the sloping side of the Acropolis, and consisted of a 
vast number of semicircular rows of seats cut out of the solid rock, accommodating 
thirty thousand persons. The front row, composed of white marble arm-chairs, 
was occupied by the priests, the judges, and the archons, each chair being 
engraved with the name of its occupant. Between the audience and the stage was 
the orchestra or place for the chorus, in the center of which stood the altar of 
Dionysus. Movable stairs led from the orchestra up to the stage, as the course of 
the drama frequently required the conjunction of the chorus with the actors. The 
stage itself extended the whole width of the theater, but was quite narrow, except 
at the center, where the representation took place. It was supported by a white 
marble wall, handsomely carved. There was a variety of machinery for change of 
scenes and for producing startling effects, such as the rolling of thunder, the descent 
of "Ods from heaven, the rising of ghosts and demons from below, etc. The theater 



188 GREECE. 

Each tribe furnished a chorus of dancers and musicians, and chose 
a choragus, whose business was not only to superintend the training 
and costumes of the performers, but also to bear all the expense of 
bringing out the play assigned to him. The office was one of high 
dignity, and immense sums were spent by the choragi in their efforts 
to eclipse each other ; the one adjudged to have given the best enter- 
tainment received a tripod, which was formally consecrated in the 
temples, and placed upon its own properly inscribed monument in the 
Street of Tripods, near the theater. 

The Actors, to increase their size and enable them the better to per- 
sonate the gods and heroes of Greek tragedy, wore high-soled shoes, 
padded garments, and great masks which completely enveloped their 
heads, leaving only small apertures for the mouth and eyes. As their 
stilts and stage-attire impeded any free movements, their acting con- 
sisted of little more than a series of tableaux and recitations, while 
the stately musical apostrophes and narrations of the chorus filled 
up the gaps and supplied those parts of the story not acted on the 
stage. 1 

Tlie Performance began early in the morning, and lasted all day, 
eating and drinking being allowed in the theater. The price of seats 
varied according to location, but the poorer classes were supplied free 
tickets by the government, so that no one was shut out by poverty 
from enjoying this peculiar worship. 2 Each play generally occupied 
from one and a half to two hours. The audience was exceedingly 
demonstrative ; an unpopular actor could not deceive himself ; his 
voice was drowned in an uproar of whistling, clucking, and hissing, 

was open to the sky, but had an awning which might be drawn to shut out the direct 
rays of the sun, while little jets of perfumed water cooled and refreshed the air. To 
aid the vast assembly in hearing, brazen bell-shaped vases were placed in different 
parts of the theater. 

1 In comedy, the actors themselves often took the audience into their confidence, 
explaining the situation to them somewhat after the manner of some modern comic 
operas. 

2 Tragedy, which dealt with the national gods and heroes, was to the Greeks a 
true religious exercise, strengthening their faith, and quickening their sympathies 
for the woes of their beloved and fate-driveu deities. When, as in rare instances, 
a subject was taken from contemporaneous history, no representation which would 
pain the audience was allowed, and on one occasion a poet was heavilj'- fined for 
presenting a play which touched upon a recent Athenian defeat. Some great public 
lesson was usually hidden in the comedies, where the fashionable follies were merci- 
lessly satirized; and many a useful hint took root in the hearts of the people when 
given from the stage, that would have fallen dead or unnoticed if put forth in the 
assembly. " Quick of thought and utterance, of hearing and apprehension, living 
together in open public intercourse, reading would have been to the Athenians a slow 
process for the interchange of ideas. But the many thousands of auditors in the 
Greek theater caught, as with an electric flash of intelligence, the noble thought, the 
withering sarcasm, the flash of wit, and the coveit Innuendo."— P7iiWi> Smith. 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 



•189 



and he might esteem himself happy if he escaped from the hoards 
without an actual beating. The favorite, whether on the stage or aa 
a spectator, was as enthusiastically applauded. i In comedies, tun^ult 
was invited, and the people were urged to shout and laugh, the co:^ic 
poet sometimes throwing nuts and figs to them, that their scrambling 
and screaming might add to the evidences of a complete success. 




GRECIAN FEMALE HEADS. 

Marriage. — Athenians could legally marry only among themselves. 
The ceremony did not require a priestly oflacial, but was preceded by 
offerings to Zeus, Hera, Artemis, and other gods who presided over 
marriage. 2 Omens were carefully observed, and a bath in water from 
the sacred fountain, Kallirrhoe, was an indispensable preparation. On 
the evening of the wedding-day, after a merry dinner given at her 



1 At the Olympian games, when Themistocles entered, it is related that the whole 
assembly rose to honor him. 

2 In Homer's time the groom paid to the lady's father a certain sum for his bride. 
Afterward this custom was reversed, and the amount of the wife's dowry greatly 
affected her position as a married woman. At the formal betrothal preceding every 
marriage this important question was settled, and in case of separation the dowry 
was usually returned to the wife's parents. 



190 • GREECE. 

father's house, the closely veiled bride was seated in a chariot between 
her husband and his "best man," all dressed in festive robes and 
garlanded with flowers. Her mother kindled the nuptial torch at the 
domestic hearth, a procession of friends and attendants was formed, 
and, amid the joyful strains of the marriage-song, the whistling of 
flutes, and the blinking of torches, the happy pair were escorted to 
their future home. Here they were saluted with a shower of sweet- 
meats, after which followed the nuptial banquet. At this feast, b}^ 
privilege, the women were allowed to be present, though they sat at a 
separate table, and the bride continued veiled. The third day after 
marriage the veil was cast aside, and wedding-presents were received. 
The parties most concerned in marriage were seldom consulted, and it 
was not uncommon for a wicTow to find herself bequeathed by her 
deceased husband's will to one of his friends or relatives. 

Death and Burial. — As a portal festooned with flowers an- 
nounced a wedding, so a vessel of water placed before a door gave 
notice of a death within. i As soon as a Greek died, an obolus was 
inserted in his mouth to pay his fare on the boat across the River 
Styx to Hades. His body was then washed, anointed, dressed in 
white, garlanded with flowers, and placed on a couch with the feet 
toward the outer door. A formal lament 2 followed, made by the female 
friends and relatives, assisted by hired mourners. On the third day 
the body was carried to the spot where it was to be buried or burned. 
It was preceded by a hired chorus of musicians and the male mourners, 
who, dressed in black or gray, had their hair closely cut. 3 The female 
mourners walked behind the bier. If the body were burned, sacrifices 
were oft'ered ; then, after all was consumed, the fire was extinguished 
with wine, and the ashes, sprinkled with oil and wine, were collected 
in a clay or bronze cinerary. Various articles were stored with the 
dead, such as mirrors, trinkets, and elegantly painted vases. The 
burial was followed by a feast, which was considered as given by the 
deceased (compare p. 42). Sacrifices of milk, honey, wine, olives, and 

1 The water was always brought from some other dwelling, and was used for the 
purification of visitors, as everything within the house of mourning was polluted by 
the presence of the dead. 

2 Solon sought to restrain these ostentatious excesses by enacting that, except 
the nearest relatives, no women under sixty years of age should enter a house of 
mourning. In the heroic days of Greece the lament lasted several days (that of 
Achilles continued seventeen), but in later times an early burial was tliought pleasing 
to the dead. The funeral pomp, which afterward became a common custom, was 
originally reserved for heroes alone. In the earlier Attic burials tlie grave was dug 
by the nearest relatives, and afterward sown with corn that the body might be recom- 
pensed for its own decay. 

3 When a great general died, the hair and manes of all the army horses were 
cropped. 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 



191 



flowers were periodically offered at the grave, where slaves kept watch. 
Sometimes a regular banquet was served, and a blood-sacrifice offered 
by the side of the tomb. The dead person was supposed to be con- 
scious of all these attentions, and to be displeased when an enemy 
approached his ashes. Malefactors, traitors, and people struck by 
lightning,! were denied burial, which in Greece, as in Egypt, was the 
highest possible dishonor. 




GRECIAN WARRIOllS ANU ATTENDANT. 

Weapons of War and Defense.— The Greeks fought with long 
spears, swords, clubs, battle-axes, bows, and slings. In the heroic 
age, chariots were employed, and the warrior, standing by the side of 
the charioteer, was driven to the front, where he engaged in single 
combat. Afterward the chariot was used only in races. A soldier 
in full armor wore a leather or metal helmet, covering his head and 
face; a cuirass made of iron plates, or a leather coat of mail over- 
laid with iron scales ; bronze greaves, reaching from above the knee 



1 Such a death was supposed to be a direct punishment from the gods for some 
great offense or hidden depravity. 



192 GREECE. 

down to the ankle ; and a shield ^ made of ox-hides, covered with 
metal, and sometimes extending from head to foot. Thus equipped, 
they advanced slowly and steadily into action in a uniform phalanx of 
about eight spears deep, the warriors of each tribe arrayed together, 
so that individual or sectional bravery was easily distinguished. The 
light infantry wore no armor, but sometimes carried a shield of willow 
twigs, covered with leather. In Homer's time, bows six feet long 
were made of the horns of the antelope. Cavalry horses were pro- 
tected by armor, and the rider sat upon a saddle-cloth, a luxury not 
indulged in on ordinary occasions. Stirrups and horseshoes were un- 
known. The ships of Greece, like those of Phoenicia and Carthage, 
were flat-bottomed barges or galleys, mainly propelled by oars. The 
oarsmen sat in rows or banks, one above the other, the number of 
banks determining the name of the vessel. Bows and arrows, jave- 
lins, ballistas, and catapults were the offensive weapons used at a 
distance ; but the ordinary ship tactics were to run the sharp iron 
prow of the attacking vessel against the enemy's broadside to sink 
it, or else to steer alongside, board the enemy, and make a hand-to- 
hand fight. 

SCENES IN REAL LIFE. 

Retrospect. — We will suppose it to be about the close of the 
6th century B. c, with the Peloponnesian war just ended. The world 
is two thousand years older than when we watched the building of the 
Great Pyramid at Gizeh, and fifteen centuries have passed since the 
Labyrinth began to show its marble colonnades. Those times are even 
now remote antiquities, and fifty years ago Herodotus delighted the 
wondering Greeks with his description of the ancient ruins in the 
Fayoom. It is nearly two hundred and fifty years since Asshurbani- 
pal sat on the throne of tottering Nineveh, and one hundred and fifty 
since the fall of Babylon. Let us now visit Sparta. 

Scene I. — J Day in JSjmrta. — A hilly, unwalled city on a river 
bank, with mountains in the distance. A great square or forum 
(Agora) with a few modest temples, statues, and porticoes. On the 
highest hill (Acropolis), in the midst of a grove, more temples and 

1 These shields were sometimes richly decorated with emblems and inscriptions. 
Thus ^schylus, in The Seven Chiefs against Thebes, describes one warrior's shield 
as bearing a flaming torch, with the motto, " I will burn the citj' ; " and another as 
having an armed man climbing a scaling-ladder, and for an inscription, "Not Mars 
himself shall beat me from the towers." 

2 A ship with three banks of oars was called a trireme; with four, a quadrireme, 
etc. In the times of the Ptolemies galleys of twelve, fifteen, twenty, and even forty 
banks of oars were built. The precise arrangement of the oarsmen in these large 
Ships is not known (see cut, p. 158). 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 193 

statues, among them a brass statue of Zeus, the most ancient in Greece. 
In the suburbs the hippodrome, for foot and horse races, and the 
pUitmmtw, — a grove of beautiful palm-trees, partly inclosed by run- 
ning streams, — where the Spartan youth gather for athletic sports. A 
scattered city, its small, mean houses grouped here and there ; its 
streets narrow and dirty. This is Sparta. 

If we wish to enter a house, we have simply to announce ourselves 
in a loud voice, and a slave will admit us. We shall hear no cry of 
puny infants within ; the little boys, none of them over seven years 
old (p. 179), are strong and sturdy, and the girls are few ; their weak 
or deformed brothers and surplus sisters have been cast out in their 
babyhood to perish, or to become the slaves of a chance rescuer. 

The mother is at home, — a brawny, strong-minded, strong-fisted 
woman, whose chief pride is that she can fell an enemy with one 
blow. Her dress consists of two garments, — a chiton ; i and over it a 
peplos, or short cloak, which clasps above her shoulders, leaving her 
arms bare. She appears in public when she pleases, and may even 
give her opinion on matters of state. When her husband or sons go 
forth to battle, she sheds no sentimental tears, but hands to each his 
shield, with the proud injunction, '^Return with it, or upon it." No 
cowards, whatever their excuses, find favor with her. When the blind 
Eurytus was led by his slave into the foremost rank at Thermopylae, 
she thought of him as having simply performed his duty; when 
Aristodemus made his blindness an excuse for staying away, she re- 
viled his cowardice ; and though he afterward died the most heroic of 
deaths at Platsea, it counted him nothing. She educates her daughters 
to the same unflinching defiance of womanly tenderness. They are 
trained in the palaestra or wrestling-school to run, wrestle, and fight 
like their brothers. They wear but one garment, a short sleeveless 
chiton, open upon one side, and often not reaching to the knee. 

Tlie Spartan gentleman, who sees little of his family (p. 120), is 
debarred by law from trade or agriculture, and, having no taste for art 
or literature, spends his time, when not in actual warfare, in daily 
military drill, and in governing his helots. He never appears in public 
without his attendant slaves, but prudence compels him to walk be- 
hind rather than before them. In the street his dress is a short, coarse 
cloak, with or without a chiton; perhaps a pair of thong-strapped 
sandals, a cane, and a seal-ring. He usually goes bare-headed, but 
when traveling in the hot sun wears a broad-brimmed hat or bonnet. 
His ideal character is one of relentless energy and brute force, and his 

1 The Doric chiton was a vSimple woolen shift, consisting of two short pieces of 
cloth, sewerl or clasperl together on one or both sides up to the breast; the parts 
covering the breast and back were fastened over each shoulder, leaving the open 
spaces at the side for arm-holes. It was confined about the waist with a girdle. 



194 GREECE. 

standard of excellence is a successful defiance of all pain, and an 
ability to conquer in every fight. 

Scene II. — A Day in Athens (4th century b. c.).— To see Athens 
is, first of all, to admire the Acropolis, — a high, steep, rocky, but 
broad-crested hill, sloping toward the city and the distant sea ; ascended 
by a marble road for chariots, and marble steps for pedestrians ; en- 
tered through a magnificent gateway (the Propylasa) ; and crowned on 
its spacious summit — one hundred and fifty feet above the level at its 
base — with a grove of stately temples, statues,! and altars. 

Standing on the Acropolis, on a bright morning about the year 300 
B. c, a magnificent view opens on every side. Away to the southwest 
for four miles stretch the Long Walls, five hundred and fifty feet, apart, 
leading to the Pirasan harbor ; beyond them the sea, dotted with sails, 
glistens in the early sun. Between us and the harbors lie the porticoed 
and templed Agora, bustling with the morning commerce ; the Pnyx,2 
with its stone bema, from which Demosthenes sixty or more years ago 
essayed his first speech amid hisses and laughter ; tlie Areopagus, 
where from time immemorial the learned court of arehons has held 
its sittings ; the hill of the Museum, crowned by a fortress ; the tem- 
ples of Hercules, Demeter, and Artemis ; the Gymnasium of Hermes ; 
and, near the Pirsean gate, a little grove of statues, — among them one 
of Socrates, who drank the hemlock and went to sleep a hundred years 
ago. At our feet, circling about the hill, are amphitheaters for mu- 
sical and dramatic festivals ; elegant temples and colonnades ; and the 
famous Street of Tripods, more beautiful than ever since the recent 
erection of the monument of the choragus Lysicrates. Turning toward 
the east, we see the Lyceum, where Aristotle walked and talked 
within the last half century ; and the Cynosarges, where Antisthenes, 
the father of the Cynics, had his school. Still further to the north 
rises the white top of Mount Lycabettus, beyond which is the plain of 
Marathon ; and on the south the green and flowery ascent of Mount 
Hymettus, swarming with bees, and equally famous for its honey and 

1 Towering over all the other statues was the bronze Athena Promachus, by 
Phidias, cast out of spoils won at Marathon. It was sixty feet high, and represented 
the goddess with her spear and shield in the attitude of a combatant. Tlie remains 
of the Erechtheion, a beautiful and peculiar temple sacred to two deities, stood near 
the Parthenon. It had been burned during tlie invasion of Xerxes, but was in process 
of restoration when the Peloponnesian war broke out. Part of it was dedicated to 
Athena Polias, whose olive-wood statue witliin its walls was reputed to have fallen 
from heaven. It was also said to contain the sacred olive-tree brought forth by 
Athena, the spring of water which followed the stroke of Poseidon's trident, and 
even the impression of the trident itself. 

2 The two hills, the Pnyx and the Areopagus, were famous localities. Upon the 
former the assemblies of the people were held. The stone pulpit {bema), from which 
the orators declaimed, and traces of the leveled arena where the people gathered to 
listen, are still seen on the Pnyx. 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 



195 



its marble. Through the city, to the southeast, flows the river Ilissus, 
sacred to the Muses. As we look about us, we are struck by the ab- 
sence of sj)ires or pinnacles. There are no high towers as in Babylon ; 
no lofty obelisks as on the banks of the Nile ; the tiled roofs are all flat 
or slightly gabled, and on them we detect many a favorite promenade. 




GRECIAN LADIES AND ATIENDANT. 

A Greek Home. — The Athenian gentleman usually arises at dawn, 
and after a slight repast of broad and wine goes out with his slaves 1 
for a walk or ride, lirevious to his customary daily lounge in the market 
place. While he is absent, if we are ladies we may visit the house- 
hold. We are quite sure to find the mistress at home, for, especially 
if she be young, she never ventures outside her dwelling without her 
husband's permission ; nor does she receive within it any but her lady- 
friends and nearest male relatives. The exterior of the house is very 
plain. Built of common stone, brick, or wood, and coated with plaster, 
it abuts so closely upon the street that if the door has been made to 
open outward (a tax is paid for this privilege) the comer-out is obliged 
to knock before opening it, in order to warn the passers-by. The dead- 
wall before us has no lower windows, but a strong door furnished with 



1 No gentleman in Alliens went out unless he was accompanied by his servants. 
To be unattended by at least one slave was a sign of extreme indigence, and no more 
to be thought of than to be seen without a caue. As to the latter, "a gentleman 
found going about without a walking-stick was presumed by the police to be dis- 
orderly, and was imprisoned for the night." 



196 GREECE. 

knocker and handle, and beside it a Hermes (p. 143) or an altar to 
Apollo. Over the door, as in Egypt, is an inscription, here reading, 
" To the good genius, " followed by the name of the owner. In re- 
sponse to our knock, the porter, who is always in attendance, opens the 
door. Carefully placing our right foot on the threshold, — it would be 
an unlucky omen to touch it with the left, — we pass through a long 
corridor to a large court open to the sky, and surrounded by arcades or 
porticoes. This is the peristyle of the androiutis, or apartments be- 
longing to the master of the house. Around the peristyle lie the ban- 
queting, music, sitting, and sleeping rooms, the picture galleries and 
libraries. A second corridor, opening opposite the first, leads to another 
porticoed court, with rooms about and behind it. This is the gynce- 
conitis, the domain of the mistress. Here the daughters and hand- 
maidens always remain, occupied with their wool-carding, spinning, 
weaving, and embroidery, and hither the mother retires when her 
husband entertains guests in the andronitis. The floors are plastered 
and tastefully painted,! the walls are frescoed, and 
the cornices and ceilings are ornamented with 
stucco. The rooms are warmed from fireplaces, or 
braziers of hot coke or charcoal ; they are lighted 
mostly from doors opening upon the porticoes. In 
the first court is an altar to Zeus, and in the second 
the never-forgotten one to Hestia. The furniture 
is simple, but remarkable for elegance of design. 
Along the walls are seats or sofas covered with 
ANCIENT BRAZIER. gkins or purplc carpets, and heaped with cushions. 
There are also light folding-stools 2 and richly 
carved arm-chairs, and scattered about the rooms are tripods support- 
ing exquisitely painted vases. In the bedrooms of this luxurious 
home are couches of every degree of magnificence, made of olive-wood 
inlaid with gold and ivory or veneered with tortoise-shell, or of 
ivory richly embossed, or even of solid silver. On these are laid 
mattresses of sponge, feathers, or plucked wool ; and over them soft, 
gorgeously colored blankets, or a coverlet made of peacock skins, 
dressed with the feathers on,^ and perfumed with imported essences. 

1 In later times flagging and mosaics were used. Before the 4th century B. c. the 
plaster walls were simply whitewashed, 

2 The four-legged, backless stool was called a diphros ; when an Athenian gentle- 
man walked out, one of his slaves generally carried a dipliros for the convenience of 
his master when wearied. To the diphros a curved back was sometimes added, and 
the legs made immovable. It was then called a klismos. A high, large cliair, with 
straight back and low arms, was a thronos. The thronoi in the temples were for the 
gods, those in dwellings, for the master and his guests. A footstool was indisj)en. 
sable, and was sometimes attached to the front legs of the thronos. 

3 "One of the greatest improvements introduced by the Greeks into the art ol 




THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 197 

The mistress of the house, who is superintending the domestic labor, 
is dressed in a long chiton, doubled over at the top so as to form a kind 
of cape which hangs down loosely, clasped on the shoulders, girdled 
at tlie waist, and falling in many folds to her feet. When she ventures 
abroad, as she occasionally does to the funeral of a near relation, to 
the great religious festivals, and sometimes to hear a tragedy, she 
wears a cloak or MmationA The Athenian wife has not the privileges 
of the Spartan. The husband and father is the complete master of his 
household, and, so far from allowing his wife to transact any inde- 
pendent bargains, he may be legally absolved from any contract her 
request or counsel has induced him to make. — This is a busy morning 
in the home, for the master has gone to the market place to invite a 
few friends to an evening banquet. Tlie foreign cooks, hired for the 
occasion, are already here, giving orders, and preparing choice dishes. 
At noon, all business in the market place liaving ceased, the Athenian 
gentleman returns to his home for his mid-day meal and his siesta. 2 
As the cooler hours come on, he re^^airs to the crowded gymnasium, 
wliere he may enjoy the pleasures of the bath, listen to the learned 
lectures of philosophers and rlietoriciaus, or join in the racing, mili- 
tary, and gymnastic exercises. 3 Toward sunset he again seeks his 
home to await his invited guests. 

llie Banquet. — ^As each guest arrives, a slaved meets him in the 
court, and ushers him into the large triclinium or dining-room, where 
his host warmly greets him, and assigns to him a section of a couch. 
Before he reclines, 5 however, a slave unlooses his sandals and washes 

sleeping was the practice of undressing before going to bed,— a thing unheard of until 
liit upon by their inventive genius."— i^eMon. 

1 The dress of botli sexes was nearly the same. The himation was a large, square 
piece of cloth, so wrapped about the form as to leave only the right arm free. Much 
skill was required to drape it artistically, and the taste and elegance of the wearer 
were decided by his manner of carrying it. The same himation often served for both 
husband and wife, and it is related as among the unamiable traits of Xantippe, the 
shrewish wife of Socrates, that she refused to go out in her husband's himation. A 
gentleman usually wore a chiton also, though he was considered fully dressed in the 
himation alone. The lower classes wore only the chiton, or were clothed in tanned 
skins. Raiment was cheap in Greece. In the time of Socrates a chiton cost about a 
dollar i and an ordinary himation, two dollars. 

2 The poorer classes gathered together in groups along the porticoes for gossip 
or slumber, where indeed they not unfrequently spent their nights. 

3 Ball-playing, which was a favorite game with the Greeks, was taught scien- 
tifically in the gymnasium. The balls were made of colored leather, stuffed with 
feathers, wool, or fig-seeds, or, if very large, were hollow. Cock-and-quail fighting 
was another exciting amusement, and at Athens took place annually bylaw, as an 
instructive exhibition of bravery. < 

4 A guest frequently brought his own slave to assist in personal attendance upon 
himself. 

6 The mode of reclining, which was similar to that in Assyria, is shown in th© 



198 



GREECE. 



his feet in perfumed wine. The time having arrived for dinner, water 
is passed around for hand ablutions, and small, low tables are brought 
in, one being placed before each couch. There are no knives and forks, 
no table-cloths or napkins. Some of the guests wear gloves to enable 




A GliEEK SyMPOSIUM. 



them to take the food quite hot, others have hardened their fingers by- 
handling hot pokers, and one, a noted gourmand, has prepared him- 
self with metallic finger-guards. The slaves now hasten with the first 
course, which opens with sweetmeats, and includes many delicacies, 



cut, "A Greek Symposium." The place of honor was next the host. Tlie Greek wife 
and daughter never appeared at these banquets, aiul at their every-day meals the 
wife sat on the couch at the feet of her master. The sons were not permitted to 
recline till they were of age. 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 199 

such as thrushes, hares, oysters, pungent herbs, and, best of all, 
Copaie eels, cooked crisp and brown, and wrapped in beet-leaves. ^ 
Bread is handed around in tiny baskets, woven of slips of ivory. Little 
talking is done, for it is good breeding to remain quiet until the sub- 
stantial viands are honored. From time to time the guests wipe their 
fingers upon bits of bread, throwing the fragments under the table. 
This course being finished, the well-trained slaves sponge or remove 
the tables, brush up the dougli, bones, and other remnants from the 
floor, and pass again the perfumed water for hand-washing. Garlands 
of myi'tle and roses, gay ribbons, and sweet-scented ointments are 
distributed, a golden bowl of wine is brought, and the meal closes 
with a libation. 

The Symposiwn is introduced by a second libation, accompanied by 
hymns and the solemn notes of a flute. The party, hitherto silent, 
rapidly grow merry, while the slaves bring in the dessert and the wine, 
which now for the first time appears at the feast. The dessert con- 
sists of fresh fruits, olives well ripened on the tree, dried figs, imported 
dates, curdled cream, honey, cheese, and the salt-sprinkled cakes for 
which Athens is renowned. A large crater or wine-bowl, ornamented 
with groups of dancing bacchanals, is placed before one of the 
guests, who has been chosen archon. He is to decide upon the proper 
mixture of the wine,2 the nature of the forfeits in the games of the 
evening, and, in fact, is henceforth king of the feast. The sport be- 
gins with riddles. This is a favorite pastime ; every failure in guessing 
requires a forfeit, and the penalty is to drink a certain quantity of 
wine. Music, charades, dancing and juggling performed by profes- 
sionals, and a variety of entertainments, help the hours to fly, and 
the Symposium ends at last by the whole party inviting them- 
selves to some other banqueting-place, where they spend the night 
in revel. 3 

1 The Greeks were extravagantly fond of fish. Pork, the abhorred of the Egyp- 
tians, was their favorite meat. Bread, more than anything else, was the " staff of 
life," all other food, except sweetmeats— even meat— being called relish. Sweetmeats 
were superstitiously regarded, and scattering them about the house was an invitation 
to good luck. 

2 To drink wine clear was disreputable, and it was generally diluted with two 
thirds water. 

3 The fashionable Symposia were usually of the character described above, but 
sometimes they were more intellectual, affording an occasion for the brilliant display 
of Attic wit and learning. The drinking character of the party was always the 
same, and in Plato's dialogue, The Symposium, in which Aristoplianes, Socrates, and 
other literary celebrities took part, the evening is broken in upon by two different 
bauds of revelers, and daylight finds Socrates and Aristophanes still drinking with 
the host. " Parasites (a recognized class of people, who lived by sponging their 
dinners) and mountebanks always took the liberty to drop in wherever there was 
a feast, a fact which tliey ascertained by walking through the streets and snuffing at 
the kitchens."- i^eWon. 



200 GREECE. 



4. SUMMARY. 

1. Political History. — The Pelasgians are the primitive inhab- 
itants of Greece. In time the Hellenes descend from the north, 
and give their name to the land. It is the Heroic Age, the era of the 
sons of the gods, — Hercules, Theseus, and Jason, — of the Argonautic 
Expedition and the Siege of Troy. With the Dorian Migration 
("Return of the Heraclidae "), and their settlement in the Pelopon- 
nesus, the mythic stories end and real history begins. The kings 
disappear, and nearly all the cities become little republics. Hellenic 
colonies arise in Asia Minor, rivaling the glory of Greece itself. Ly- 
curgus now enacts his rigid laws (850 B. c). In the succeeding 
centuries the Spartans — pitiless, fearless, haughty warriors — conquer 
Messenia, become the head of the Peloponnesus, and threaten all 
Greece. Meanwhile — spite of Draco's Code, the AlcmaeonidaB's curse, 
the factions of the men of the plain, the coast, and the mountain, and 
the tyranny of the Pisistratidse — Athens, by the wise measures of 
Solon and Cleisthenes, becomes a powerful republic. 

Athens now "sends help to the Greeks of Asia Minor against the 
Persians, and the Asiatic deluge is precipitated upon Greece. Miltiades 
defeats Darius on the field of Marathon (490 B. c). Ten years later 
Xerxes forces the Pass of Thermopylae, slays Leonidas and his three 
hundred Spartans, and burns Athens ; but his fleet is put to flight at 
Salamis, the next year his army is routed by Pausanias at Plataea, 
and his remaining ships are destroyed at Mycale. Thus Europe is 
saved from Persian despotism. 

The Age of Pericles follows, and Athens, grown to be a great com- 
mercial city, — its streets thronged with traders and its harbor with 
ships, — is the head of Greece. Sparta is jealous, and the Peloponnesian 
war breaks out in 431 b. c. Its twenty-seven years of alternate vic- 
tories and defeats end in the fatal expedition to Syracuse, the defeat 
of Ji^gospotami, and the fall of Athens. 

Sparta is now supreme ; but her cruel rule is broken by Epaminon- 
das on the field of Leuctra. Thebes comes to the front, but Greece, 
rent by rivalries, is overwhelmed by Philip of Macedon in the battle 
of Chseronea. The conqueror dying soon after, his greater son, 
Alexander, leads the armies of united Greece into Asia. The battles 
of Granicus, Issus, and Arbela subdue the Persian Empire. Thence 
the conquering leader marches eastward to the Indus, and returns to 
Babylon only to die (323 B. c). His generals divide his empire among 
themselves ; while Greece, a prey to dissensions, at last drops into the 
all-absorbing Roman Empire (146 B. C), 



SUMMARY. 201 

2. Civilization. — ^Athens and Sparta differ widely in thought, 
habits, and taste. TJie Sjfartans care little for art and literature, and 
glory only in war and patriotism. They are rigid in their self-dis- 
cipline, and cruel to their slaves. They smother all tender home sen- 
timent, eat at the public mess, give their seven-year-old boys to the 
state, and train their girls in the rough sports of the paleestra. They 
distrust and exclude strangers, and make no effort to adorn their 
capital with art or architecture. 

TJie Athenians adore art, beauty, and intellect. Versatile and 
brilliant, they are fond of novelties and eager for discussions. Law 
courts abound, and the masses imbibe an education in the theater, 
along the busy streets, and on the Pnyx. In their democratic city, 
filled with magnificent temples, statues, and colonnades, wit and talent 
are the keys that unlock the doors of every saloon. Athens becomes 
the center of the world's history in all that pertains to the fine arts. 
Poetry and philosophy flourish alike in her classic atmosphere, and all 
the colonies feel the pulse of her artistic heart. 

Grecian Art and Literature furnish models for all time. Infant 
Greece produces Homer and Hesiod, the patriarchs of epic poetry. 
Coming down the centuries, she brings out in song, and hymn, and ode, 
Sappho, Simonides, and Pindar; in tragedy, ^schylus, Sophocles, 
and Euripides; in comedy, Aristophanes and Menander; in history, 
Herodotus, Thucydides, and Xenophon ; in oratory, Pericles and 
Demosthenes ; in philosophy, Thales, Pythagoras, Socrates, Plato, and 
Aristotle ; in painting, Apelles ; in sculpture, Phidias, Praxiteles, and 
Lysippus. 

Greek Mythology invests every stream, grove, and mountain with 
gods and goddesses, nymphs, and naiads. The beloved deities are 
worshiped with songs and dances, dramas and festivals, spirite(3 
contests and gorgeous processions. The Four Great National Games 
unite all Greece in a sacred bond. The Feasts of Dionysus give birth 
to the drama. The Four Great Schools of Philosophy flourish and 
decay, leaving their impress upon the generations to come. Finally 
Grecian civilization is transported to the Tiber, and becomes blended 
with the national peculiarities of the conquering Romans. 



READING REFERENCES. 

Grote's History of Greeos.— Arnold's History of Greece.— Curtius's History of 
Greece.— Felton's Ancient and Modern Greece.— History Primers,- Greece, and Greek 
Antiquities, edited by Green..— Smith's Student's History of Greece.— Becker's Chari- 
cles.—Guhl and Koner's Life of the Greeks and Romans.— Bryce's History of Greece^ 
in Freeman's Series. — Freeman's General Sketch of European History.- Collier's 
History of Greece— Heer en's Historical Researches.— Putz's Handbook of Ancient 



202 



GREECE. 



History.— Bulwers Rise and Fall of Athens.- Williams's Life of Alexander the 
Great— ThirlwalVs History of Greece.- Schliemann'c llios. and Troja-Niebuhrs 
Lectures on Ancient History.— Xenophon's Anabasis, Memorabilia, and Cyropcedia. 
—St. John's The Hellenes.-Fergusson's History of Architecture.— Stuart s Antiqui- 
ties of Athens.— Mahaffy's History of Greek Literature— Murray's Hand-book of 
Greek Archceology. 

CHRONOLOGY. 

B. C. 

Dorian Migration, abont ,,_ 1100 

Lycurgus, about 850 

First Olympiad 77g 

[It is curious to notice how many important events cluster about tliis period, 
viz.: Rome was founded in 753; the Era of Nabonasspr in Babylon began 
747; and Tiglath Pileser II., the great military king of Assyria, ascended 
the throne, 745.] 

First Messenian War 743-724 

Second Messenian War ....685-668 

Draco 521 

Solon 594 

Pisistratus 560 

Battle of Marathon 490 

Battles of Thermopylae and Salamis 480 

" " Plattea and Mycale 479 

Age of Pericles 479-429 

Peloponnesian War 431-404 

Retreat of the Ten Thousand 400 

Battle of Leuctra 371 

Demosthenes delivered his " First Philippic " (Oration against Philip) 352 

Battle of Chaeronea 338 

Alexander the Great 336-323 

Battle of the Granicus 334 

" " ISSUS 333 

" " Arbela ^' 331 

Oration of Demosthenes on "The Crown" 330 

Battle of Ipsus 301 

Greece becomes a Roman Province 146 




BAS-UELIEF OF THE NINE MUSES. 




-THE PROVINCES 

OF THE 

ROMAN EMPIRE^ 

at the time of its greatest extent 

SCALE OF ENGLISH MILES 



100 500 

On this Map Italia is divided into the 11 Regions of Augustus. 



J.WELLS, DEL. 



ROME. 



1. THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 

While Greece was winning her freedom on the fields of 
Marathon and Plataea, and building up the best civilization 
the world had then seen ; while Alexander was carrying the 
Grecian arms and culture over the East; while the Con- 
queror's successors were wrangling over the prize he had 
won ; while the Ptolemies were transplanting Grecian 
thought, but not Grecian freedom, to Egyptian soil, — 
there was slowly growing up on the banks of the Tiber a 
city that was to found an empire wider than Alexander's, 
and, molding Grecian civilization, art, and literature into 
new forms, preserve them long after Greece had fallen. 

Contrasts between Greece and Italy. — Duration. — 
Greek history, from the First Olympiad (776 B. c.) to the 
Roman Conquest (146 B. c), covers about six centuries, but 
the national strength lasted less than two centui'ies ; Roman 
history, from the founding of Rome (753 b. c.) to its down- 
fall (476 A. D.), stretches over twelve centuries. 

OeograpMcal Questions.— &>ee maps, pp. 210 and 255. Describe the Tiber. Locate 
Rome ; Ostia ; Alba Longa ; Veii (Veji) ; the Sabines , the Etruscans. Where was 
Carthage? New Carthage? Saguntuml Syracuse? Lake Trasimenus? Capua? 
CannsB? Tarentum? Cisalpine Gaul? lapygia (the "heel of Italy," reaching toward 
Greece)? Bmtiura (the " toe of Italy ") ? What were tlie limits of the empire at the 
time of Its greatest extent? Name the principal countries which it then included. 
Locate Alexandria ; Antioch ; Smyrna ; Philippi ; Byzantium. 



204 ROME. 

Manner of Growth. — Greece, cut up into small valleys, 
grew around many little centers, and no two leaves on her 
tree of liberty were exactly alike ; Italy exhibited the un- 
broken advance of one imperial city to universal dominion. 
As a result, we find in Greece the fickleness and jealousies 
of petty states ; in Italy, the power and resources of a mighty 
nation. 

Direction of Groivth. — Greece lay open to the East, whence 
she originally drew her inspiration, and whither she in time 
returned the fruits of her civilization ; Italy lay open to the 
West, and westward sent the strength of her civilization to 
regenerate barbarian Europe. 

Character of Influence. — The mission of Greece was to ex- 
hibit the triumphs of the mind, and to illustrate the prin- 
ciples of hberty; that of Rome, to subdue by irresistible 
force, to manifest the power of law, and to bind the nations 
together for the coming of a new religion. 

Ultimate Results. — When Greece fell from her high estate, 
she left only her history and the achievements of her artists 
and statesmen ; when the Roman Empire broke to pieces, the 
great nations of Europe sprang from the ruins, and their 
languages, civilization, laws, and religion took their form 
from the Mistress of the World. 

The Early Inhabitants of Italy were mainly of the 
same Aryan swarm that settled Greece. But they had be- 
come very different from the Hellenes, and had split into 
various hostile tribes. Between the Arno and the Tiber 
lived the Etruscans or Tuscans, — a league of twelve cities. 
These people were great builders, and skilled in the arts. 
In northern Italy, Cisalpine Gaul was inhabited by Celts, 
akin to those upon the other side of the Alps. Southern 
Italy contained many prosperous GreeJc cities. The Italians 
occupied central Italy. They were divided into the Latins 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 



205 



and Oscans. The former comprised a league of tMrty 
towns (note, p. 117) south of the Tiber ; the latter consisted 
of various tribes living eastward, — Samnites, Sabines, etc.^ 
B.ome was foiinded^ (753 b. c.) by the Latins, perhaps 



1 Some authorities group the Samnites, Sabines, Umbrians, Oscans, Sabelliaus, 
'^tc, as the Umbrians ; and others call them the Umbro Sabellians. They were 
doubtless closely related. 

2 Of the early history of Rome there is no reliable account, as the records 
were burned when the city was destroyed by the Gauls (390 b. c), and it was five 
hundred years after the founding of the city (A. U. C, anno urbis conditce) before the 
tirst rude attempt was made to write a continuous narrative of its oiigin. The names 
of the early monarchs are probably personifications, rather than the appellations of 
real persons. The word " Rome " itself means border, and piobably had no relation to 
the fabled Romulus. The history which was accepted in later times by the Romans, 
and has come down to us, is a series of beautiful legends. In the text is given the 
real history as now received by the best critics, and in the notes the mythical stories. 

^NEAS, favored by the god 
Mercury and led by his mother 
Venus, came, after the destruc- 
tion of Troy, to Italy. There his 
son Ascanius built the Long 
White City (Alba Louga). His 
descendants reigned m peace for 
three hundred years. When it 
came time, according to the de- 
cree of the gods, that Rome 
should be founded, 

ROMULUS AND REMUS Were 
born. Their mother, Rhea Silvia, 
was a priestess of the goddess 
Vesta, and their father. Mars, the 
god of war. Amulius, who had 
usurped the Alban throne from 
their grandfather Numitor, or- 
dered the babes to be thrown 
into the Tiber. They were, how- 
ever, cast ashore at the foot of 
Mount Palatine. Here they were 
nursed by a wolf. One Faustulus, 
passing near, was struck by the 
sight, and, carrying the children 
home, brought them up as his 
own. Romulus and Remus, on 
coming to age, discovered their 
true rank, slew the usurper, and restored their grandfather Numitor to his throne. 

Founding of Rome.— The brothers then determined to found a city near the spot 
where they had been so wonderfully preserved, and agreed to watch the flight of 
birds m order to decide which should fix upon the site. Remus, on the Aventine 
Hill, saw six vultures but Romulus, on the Palatine, saw twelve, and was declared 
victor. He accoi-dingiy began to mark out the bounaanes with a brazen plow, 
drawn by a builock and a heifer. As the mud wall rose, Remus m scorn jumped 




"ti ^;:?v 

ROMAN WOLF STATUE. 



206 



ROME 



a colony sent out from Alba Louga, as an outpost against 
the Etruscans, whom they greatly feared. At an early date 
it contained about one thousand miserable, thatched huts, 
surrounded by a wall. Most of the inhabitants were shep- 
herds or farmers, who tilled the land upon the plain near 
by, but lived for protection within their fortifications on 
the Palatine Hill. It is probable that the other hills, after- 
ward covered by Rome, were then occupied by Latins, and 
that the cities of Latium formed a confederacy, with Alba 
Longa at the head. 



over it; whereupon Roraulns slew him, exclaimlTig, "So perish everyone who may 
try to leap over these ramparts ! " The new city he called Rome after his own name, 
and became its first king. To secure inhabitants, he opened an asylum for refugees 
and criminals ; but, lacking women, he resorted to a curious expedient. A great 
festival in honor of Neptune was appointed, and the neighboring people were invited 
to come with their families. In the midst of the games tlie young Romans rushed 
among the spectators, and each, seizing a maiden, carried her off to be his wife. The 
indignant parents returned home, but only to come back in arms, and thirsting for 
vengeance. The Sabines laid siege to the citadel on the Capitoline Hill. Tarpeia, 
the commandant's daughter, dazzled by the glitter of their golden bracelets and 

rings, promised to betray the 
fortress if the Sabines would 
give her " what they wore on 
their left arms." As they 
passed in tlirough the gate, 
which she opened for them 
in the night, they crushed her 
beneath their heavy shields. 
Henceforth that part of the 
hill was called the Tarpeian 
Rock, and down its precipice 
traitors were hurled to death. 
The next day after Tarpeia's 
treachery, the battle raged in 
tlie valley between the Capi- 
toline and Palatine Hills. In 
his distress, Romulus vowed 
a temple to Jupiter. The Ro- 
mans thereupon turned, and 
drove back their foes. In the 
flight, Mettius Curtius, the 
leader of the Sabines, sunk 
with his horse into a marsh, 
and nearly perished. Ere the contest could be renewed, the Sabine women, with 
disheveled hair, suddenly rushed between their kindred and new-found husbands, 
and implored peace. Their entreaties prevailed, the two people united, and their 
kings reigned jointly. As the Sabines came from Cures, the united people were 
called Romans and Quirites. 




THE TARPEIAN ROCK (FROM AN OLD PRINT). 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 



207 



The Early Government was aristocratic. It had a 
king, a senate, and an assembly. The priest-king offered 
sacrifices, and presided over the senate. The senate had the 
right to discuss and vote; the assembly, to discuss only. 
Each original family or house {gens) was represented in 
the senate by its head. This body was therefore composed 
of the fathers (patres), and was from the beginning the 
soul of the rising city ; while throughout its entire history 
the intelligence, experience, and wisdom gathered in the 
senate determined the pohcy and shaped the public Ufe 



Romulus, after the death of Tatius, became sole king. He divided the people into 
nobles and commons ; the former he called patricians, and the latter plebeians. The 
patricians were separated into three tTiheH,—Eamnes, Tities, and Luceres. In each of 
these he made ten divisions, or curice. The thirty curiaj formed the assembly of the 
people. The plebeians, being apportioned as tenants and dependants among the 
• patricians, were called clients. One hundred of the patricians were chosen for age and 
wisdom, and styled fathers (patres). After Romulus had reigned thirty-seven years, 
and done all these things according to the will of the gods, one day, during a violeut 
thunder-storm, he disappeared from sight, and was henceforth worshiped as a god. 

NUMA POMPiLius, a pious Sabine, was the second king. Numa was wise from 
his youth, as a sign of which his hair was gray at birth. He was trained by Pythag- 
oras (p. 174) in all the knowledge of the Greeks, 
and was wont, in a sacred grove near Rome, to 
meet the nymph Egerja, who taught him lessons 
of wisdom, and how men below should worship 
the gods above. By pouring wine into tlie spring 
whence Faunus and Picus, the gods of the wood, 
drank, he led them to tell him the secret charm 
to gain the will of Jupiter. Peace smiled on the 
land during his happy reign, and the doors of the 
temple of Janus remained closed. 

TULLUS HosTiLius, the third king, loved war 
as Numa did peace. He soon got into a quarrel 
with Alba Longa. As the armies were about to 
fight, it was agreed to decide the contest by a 
combat between the Horatii (three brothers in 
the Roman ranks) and the Curatii (three brothers 
in the Alban). They were cousins, and one of the 

Curatii was engaged to be married to a sister of one of the Horatii. In the fight 
two of the Horatii were killed, when the third pretended to run. The Curatii, be- 
cause of their wounds, followed him slowly, and, becoming separated, he turned 
about and slew them one by one. As the victor returned laden with the spoils, he 
met his sister, who, catching sight of the robe which she had embroidered for her 
lover, burst into tears. Horatius, unable to bear her reproaches, struck her dead, 
saying, " So perish any Roman woman who laments a foe ! " The murderer was con- 
demned to die, but the people spared him because his valor had saved Rome. Alba 
submitted, but, the inhabitants proving treacherous, the city was razed, and the people 
were taken to Rome and located on the Ccelian Hill. The Albans and the Romans 




TEMPLE OF JANUS, 



208 



ROME. 



that made Rome the Mistress of the World. The assembly 
{comitia curiata) consisted of the men belonging to these 
ancient families. Its members voted by curice; each curia 
contained the voters of ten houses (gentes). 

Sabine Invasion and League. — The Sabines, coming 
down the valley of the Tiber, captured the CapitoHne and 
Quirinal Hills.' At first there were frequent conflicts be- 
tween these near neighbors, but they soon came into alliance. 
Finally the two tribes formed one city, and the people were 
thereafter known as Romans and Quirites. Both had seats in 

now became one nation, as the Sabines and the Romans had become in the days of 
Romulus. In his old age, Tullus sought to find out the will of Jupiter, using the spells 
of Numa, but angry Jove struck him with a thunderbolt. 

ANGUS MARCius, the grandson of Numa, conquered many Latin cities, and, 
bringing the inhabitants to Rome, gave them homes on 
the Aventine Hill. He wrote Numa's laws on a white 
board in the Forum, built a bridge over the Tiber, and 
erected the Mameitine Prison, the first in the city. 

Tarquinius Pkiscus, the fifth king, was an Etruscan, 
who came to Rome during the reign of Ancus. As he 
approached the city, an eagle flew, circling above his 
head, seized his cap, rose high in air, and then returning 
replaced it. His wife, Tanaquil, being learned in augury, 
foretold that he was coming to distinguished honor. Her 
prediction proved true, for he greatly pleased Ancus, 
who named him as his successor in place of his own 
children. The people ratified the choice, and the event 
proved its wisdom. Tarquin built the famous Drain 
(cloaca), which still remains, with scarce a stone dis- 
placed. He planned the Great Race-Course (Circus 
Maximus) and its games. He conquered Etruria, and 
the Etruscans sent him "a golden crown, a scepter, 
an ivory chair, a purple toga, an embroidered tunic, 
and an ax tied in a bundle of rods." So the Romans 
adopted these emblems of royal power as signs of 
their dominion. 

Now, there was a boy named Servius Tullius brought 
up in the palace, who was a favorite of the king. One 
day while the child was asleep lambent flames were seen 
playing about his head. Tanaquil foresaw from this 
that he was destined to great things. He was hence- 
forth in high favor; he married the king's daughter, 
and became his counselor. The sons of Ancus, fearing 
lest Servius should succeed to the throne, and being 
wroth with Tarquin because of the loss of their paternal 
inheritance, assassinated the king. But Tanaquil re- 
ported that Tarquin was only wounded, and wished that 
Servius might govern until he recovered. Before the deception was discovered, 




ROMAN FASCES. 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 209 

the senate, and the king was taken alternately from each. 
This was henceforth the mode of Rome's growth ; she ad- 
mitted her aUies and conquered enemies to citizenship, thus 
adding their strength to her own, and making her victories 
their victories. 

Alba Liong^a, the chief town of the Latin League and 
the mother city of Rome, was herself, after a time, destroyed, 
and the inhabitants were transferred to Rome. The Alban 
nobles, now perhaps called Luceres, with the Sabines {Titles) j 
already joined to the original Romans (Bamnes), made the 

Servius was firmly fixed in his seat. He made a league with the Latins, and, as 
a sign of the union, built to Diana a temple on the Aventine, where both peoples 
offered annual sacrifices for Rome and Latium. He enlarged Rome, inclosing the 
seven hills with a stone wall, and divided the city into four parts,— called tribes, after 
the old division of the people as instituted by Romulus,— and all the land about into 
twenty-six districts. The son of a bond-maid, Servius favored the common people. 
This was shown in his separation of all the Romans— patricians and plebeians— into 
five classes, according to their wealth. These classes were subdivided into centuries, 
and they were to assemble in this military order when the king wished to consult 
concerning peace or war, or laws. In the centuriate assembly the richest citizens 
had the chief influence, for they formed eighty centuries, and the knights (equites) 
eighteen centuries, each having a vote ; while fewer votes were givei) to the lower 
classes. But this arrangement was not unjust, since the wealthy were to provide 
themselves with heavy armor, and fight in the front rank ; while the poorest citizens, 
who formed but one century, were exempt from military service. 

The two daughters of Servius were married to the two sons of Tarquinius the 
Elder. The couples were ill matched, in each case the good and gentle being mated 
with the cruel and haughty. Finally, TuUia murdered her husband, and Lucius 
killed his wife, and these two partners in crime, and of like evil instincts, were mar- 
ried. Lucius now conspired with the nobles against the king. His plans being ripe, 
one day he went into the senate and sat down on the throne. Servius, hearing the 
tumult which arose, hastened thither, whereupon Lucius hurled the king headlong 
down the steps. As the old man was tottering homeward, the usurper's attendants 
followed and murdered him. Tullia hastened to the senate to salute her husband as 
king ; but he, somewhat less brutal than she, ordered her back. While returning, 
her driver came to the prostrate body of the king, and was about to turn aside, when 
she fiercely bade him go forward. Th(5 blood of her father spattered her dress as 
the chariot rolled over his lifeless remains. The place took its name from this horrible 
deed, and was thenceforth known as the Wicked Street. 

Lucius tarquinius, who thus became the seventh and last king, was surnamed 
Superbus (the Proud). He erected massive edifices, compelling the workmen to re- 
ceive such pitiable wages that many in despair committed suicide. In digging the 
foundations of a temple to Jupiter, a bleeding head {caput) was discovered. This the 
king took to be an omen that the city was to become the head of the world, and so gave 
the name Capitoline to the temple, and the hill on which it stood. In the vaults of 
this temple were deposited the Sibylline books, concerning which a singular story was 
told. One day a sibyl from Cumae came to the king, offering to sell him for a fabu- 
k»us sum ijine books of prophecies. Tarquin declined to buy, whereupon she burned 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 211 

number of tribes three 5 of curiae, thirty; and of houses, 
(probably) three hundred. 

Etruscan Conquest. — The rising city was, in its turn, 
conquered by the Etruscans, who placed the Tarquins on 
the throne. This foreign dynasty were builders as well as 
warriors. They adorned Rome with elegant edifices of 
Etruscan architecture. They added the adjacent heights to 
the growing capital, and extended around the ^' seven-hilled 
city" a stone wall, which lasted eight centuries. Rome, 
within one hundred and fifty years after her founding, be- 
came the head of Latium. 

three of the books, and demanded the same price for the remaining six. Tarquin 
laughed, thinking her mad ; but when she burned three more, and still asked the 
original amount for the other volumes, the king began to reflect, and finally bought 
the books. They were thereafter jealously guarded, and consulted in all great state 
emergencies. 

The Latin town of Gabii was taken by a stratagem. Sextus, the son of Tarquin, 
pretending to have fled from his father's, ill usage, took refuge in that city. Hav- 
ing secured the confidence of the people, he secretly sent to his father, asking 
advice. Tarquin merely took the :aiessenger into his garden, and, walking to and fro, 
knocked off with his cane the tallest poppies. Sextus read his father's meaning, and 
managed to get rid of the chief men of Gabii, when it was easy to give up the place to 
the Romans. 

Tarquin was greatly troubled by a strange omen, a serpent having eaten the sacri- 
fice on the royal altar. The two sons of the king were accordingly sent to consult 
the oracle at Delphi. T4»ey were accompanied by their cousin Junius, called Brutus 
because of his silliness ; which, however, was only assumed, through fear of the tyrant 
who had already killed his brother. The king's sons made the Delphic god costly 
presents; Brutus brought only a simple staff, but, unknown to the rest, this was 
hollow and filled with gold. Having executed their commission, the young men 
asked the priestess which of them should be king. The reply was, " The one who 
fii'st kisses his mother." On reaching Italy, Brutus, pretending to fall, kissed the 
ground, the common mother of us all. 

As the royal princes and Tarquinius CoUatinus were one day feasting in the camp 
a dispute arose concerning the industry of their wives. To decide it they at once 
hastened homeward through the darkness. They found the king's daughters at a 
festival, while Lucretia, the wife of CoUatinus, was in the midst of her slaves, distaff 
in hand. CoUatinus was exultant ; but soon after, Lucretia, stung by the insults 
she received from Sextus, killed herself, calling upon her friends to avenge her 
fate. Brutus, casting off the mask of madness, drew forth the dagger she used, and 
vowed to kill Sextus and expel the detested race. The oath was repeated as the red 
blade passed from hand to hand. The people rose in indignation, and drove the 
Tarquins from the city. Henceforth the Romans hated the very name of king. Rome 
now became a free city after it had been governed by kings for two hundred and forty- 
five years. The people chose for rulers two consuls, elected yearly , and to offer 
sacrifices in place of the king, they selected a priest who should have no power in the 
state. 



212 ROME. 

The Servian Constitution. — The Tarquins diminislied 
patrician power and helped the plebs by a change in the 
constitution. Servius ( p. 209) divided all the Romans into 
five classes, based on property instead of birth, and these 
into one hundred and ninety-three centuries or companies. 
The people were directed to assemble by centuries (comitia 
centuriata), either to fight or to vote. This body, in fact, 
constituted an army, and was called together on the field of 
Mars by the blast of the trumpet. To the new centuriate 
assembly was given the right of selecting the king and en- 
acting the laws. The king was deprived of his power as 

Brutus and Collatinus were the first consuls. Soon after this the two sons of 
Brutus plotted to bring Tarquin back. Their father was sitting on the judgment-seat 
when they were brought in for trial. Tlie stern old Roman, true to duty, sentenced 
both to death as traitors. 

Tarquin now induced the Etruscans of the towns of Veii and Tarquinii to aid 
him, and they accordingly marched toward Rome. The Romans went forth to meet 
them. As the two armies drew near, Aruns,.son of Tarquin, catching sight of Brutus, 
rushed forward, and the two enemies fell dead, each pierced by the other's spear. 
Night checked the terrible contest which ensued. During the darkness the voice of 
the god Silvanus was heard in the woods, saying that Rome had beaten, since the 
Etruscans had lost one man more than the Romans. The Etruscans fled in dismay. 
The matrons of Rome mourned Brutus for a whole year because he had so bravely 
aveiiged the wrongs of Lucretia. 

Next came a powerful army of Etruscans under Porsenna, king of Clusium He 
captured Janiculum (a hill just aross the Tiber), and would have forced his way into 
the city with the fleeing Romans had not Horatius Codes, with two brave men, held 
the bridge while it was cut down behind them. As the timbers tottered, his com- 
panions rushed across. But he kept the enemy at bay until the shouts of the Romans 
told him the bridge was gone, when, with a prayer to Father Tiber, he leaped into the 
stream, and, amid a shower of arrows, swam safely to the bank. The people never 
tired of praising this hero. They erected a statue in his honor, and gave him as 
much land as he could plow in a day. 

"And still his name sounds stirring 
Unto the men of Rome, 
As the trumpet-blast that cries to them 

To charge the Volscian home. 
And wives still pray to Juno 

For boys with hearts as bold 
As his who kept the bridge so well 
In the brave days of old." 

Macaulay's Lays, 

Porsenna now laid siege to the city. Then Mucins, a young noble, went to the 
Etruscan camp to kill Porsenna. By mistake he slew the tieasurer. Being dragged 
before the king, and threatened with death if he tlid not confess his accomplices, he 
thrust his right hand into an altar-fire, and held it there until it was burned to a 



509B.C.] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 213 

priest, this office being conferred on the chief pontiff. The 
higher classes, aggrieved by these changes, at last combined 
with other Latin cities to expel their Etruscan rulers. 
Kings now came to an end at Rome. This was in 509 B. c, 
— a year after Hippias was driven out of Athens (p. 124). 

The Republic was then established. Two chief magis- 
trates, consuls (at first called prietors), were chosen, it being 
thought that if one turned out badly the other would check 
him. The constitution of Servius was adopted, and the 
senate, which had dwindled in size, was restored to its ideal 
number, three hundred, by the addition of one hundred and 
sixty-foiir life-members {conscripti) chosen from the richest 
of the knights {equites), several of these being plebeians. 

The Struggle between the Patricians and the 
Plebeians was the characteristic of the first two hundred 
years of the republic. The patricians were the descendants 
of the first settlers. They were rich, proud, exclusive, 
and demanded all the offices of the government. Each of 
these nobles was supported by a powerful body of clients 
or dependants. The plebeians were the newer famihes. 
They were generally poor, forbidden the rights of citizens, 

crisp. Porsenna, amazed at his firmness, gave liim his liberty. Mucins thereupon 
told the king that three hundred Roman youths had sworn to accomplish his death. 
Porsenna, alarmed for his life, made peace with Rome. Among the hostages given 
by Rome was Clcelia, a noble maiden, who, escaping from the Etruscan camp, swam 
the Tiber. The Romans sent her back, but Porsenna, admiring her courage, set her 
free. 

Tarquin next secured a league of thirty Latin cities to aid in his restoration. In 
this emergency tlie Romans appointed a dictator, who should possess absolute power 
for six months. A great battle was fought at Lake Begillus. Like most ancient con- 
tests, it began with a series of single encounters. First, Tarquin and the Roman 
dictator fought ; then the Latin dictator and the Roman master of horse. Finally 
the main armies came to blows. The Romans being worsted, their dictator vowed a 
temple to Castor and Pollux. Suddenly the Twin Brethren, taller and fairer than 
men, on snow-white horses and clad in rare armor, were seen fighting at his side. 
Everywhere the Latins broke and fled before them. Tarquin gave up his attempt in 
despair. That night two riders, tlieir horses wet with foam and blood, rode up to a 
fountain before the Temple of Vesta at Rome, and, as they washed olf in the cool 
water the traces of the battle, told how a great victory had been won over the Latin 
host (see Steele's New Astronomy, p. 227). 



214 ROiHE, [494 B.C. 

and not allowed to intermarry with the pati'icians. Obliged 
to serve in the army without pay, during their absence their 
farms remained nntilled, and were often ravaged by the 
enemy. Forced, when they returned from war, to borrow 
money of the patricians for seed, tools, and food, if they 
failed in their payments they could be sold as slaves, or cut 
in pieces for distribution among their creditors. The prisons 
connected with the houses of the great patricians were full 
of plebeian debtors. 

Secession to Mons Sacer.^ — Tribimes (494 b. c). — 
The condition of the plebs became so unbearable that they 
finally marched off in a body and encamped on the Sacred 
Mount, where they determined to build a new city, and let 
the patricians have the old one for themselves. The pa- 
tricians,^ in alarm, compromised by canceling the plebeian 
debts and appointing tribunes of the people, whose persons 
were sacred, and whose houses, standing open day and 
night, were places of refuge. To these new officers was after- 
ward given the power of veto (I forbid) over any law passed 
by the senate and considered injurious to the plebs. Such 
was the exclusiveness of the senate, however, that the trib- 
unes coidd not enter the senate-house, but were obliged to 
remain outside, and shout the "veto" through the open 
door. 

There were now two distinct peoples in Rome, each with 
its own interests and officers. This is weU illustrated in the 
fact that the agreement made on Mons Sacer was concluded 
in the form of an international treaty, with the usual oaths 
and sacrifices ; and that the magistrates of the plebs were 

1 Piso mentions the Aventine as the probable " Mons Sacer," or Sacred Mount. 

2 Old Menenius Agrippa tried to teach the plebeians a lesson in a fable. Once upon 
a time the various human organs, tired of serving so seemingly idle a member as the 
stomach, "struck work ;" accordingly the hands would carry no food to the mouth, 
and the teeth would not chew. Soon, however, all the organs began to fail, and then, 
to their surprise, they learned that they all depended on this very stomach. 



494 B. c] 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 



215 




ROMAN PLEBEIANS. 



declared to be inviolate, 
like the ambassadors of 
a foreign power. 

The Three Popu- 
lar Assemblies of 
Rome, with their pecu- 
liar organization and 
powers, marked so many 
stages of constitutional 
growth in the state. 

The Assembly of Curi- 
es (eomitia ciu'iata), the 
oldest and long the 
only one, was based on 
the patrician separation 
into tribes {Ranmes, Ti- 
tles , and Idiceres). No plebeian had a voice in this gather- 
ing, and it early lost its influence, and became a relic of 
the past. 

The Assembly of Centuries (eomitia centuriata), which came 
in with the Etruscan kings, was essentially a miUtary organi- 
zation. Based on the entire population, it gave the plebe- 
ians their first voice, though a weak one, in public affairs. 

The Assembly of the Tribes (eomitia tributa), introduced 
with the rising of the plebs, was based on the new separa- 
tion into tribes, i. 6., wards and districts. The patricians 
were here excluded, as the plebeians had been at first ; and 
Rome, which began with a purely aristocratic assembly, had 
now a purely democratic one. 

The original number of the local tribes was twenty 
in all, — four city wards and sixteen country districts. 
With the growth of the republic and the acquisition of new 
territory, the number was increased to thirty-five (241 e. c.)* 



216 ROME. [486 B.C. 

The Roman citizens were then so numerous and so scattered 
that it was impossible for them to meet at Rome to elect 
officers and make laws ; but still the organization was kept 
up till the end of the repubhc. 

An Agrarian Liaw (ciger, a field) was the next measure 
of relief granted to the common people. It was customary 
for the Romans, when they conquered a territory, to leave the 
owners a part of the land, and to take the rest for them- 
selves. Though this became public property, the patricians 
used it as their own. The plebeians, who bore the brunt of 
the fighting, naturally thought they had the best claim to 
the spoils of war, and with the assertion of their civil rights 
came now a claim for the rights of property.^ 

Spuriiis Cassms^ (486 b. c), though himself a patrician, 
secured a law ordaining that part of the public lands should 
be divided among the poor plebeians, and the patricians 
should pay rent for the rest. But the patricians were so 
strong that they made the law a dead letter, and finally, 
on the charge of wishing to be king, put Spurius to death, 
and leveled his house to the ground. The agitation, how- 
ever, still continued. 

The Decemvirs (451 b. c). — The tribunes, through 
ignorance of the laws, which were jealously guarded as the 
exclusive property of the patricians, were often thwarted 
in their measures to aid the common people. The plebs 
of Rome, therefore, like the common people of Athens 
nearly two hundred years before (p. 121), demanded that 
the laws should be made public. After a long struggle 
the senate yielded. Ten men {decemvirs) were appointed 

1 Property at that early date consisted almost entirely of land and cattle. The 
Latin word for money, pecunia (cattle), indicates this ancient identity. 

2 Spurius was the author of tlie famous League of the Romans, Latins, and Her- 
nicans, by means of which the .^quians and Volsciaus were long held in check. 
Tfte iften of the Latip League fought side hy side until after the Gallic invasion. 



451 B.C.] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 217 

to revise and publish the laws. Meanwhile the regular 
government of consuls and tribunes was suspended. The 
decemvirs did their work well, and compiled ten tables 
of laws that were acceptable. Their year of office having 
expired, a second body of decemvirs was chosen to write the 
rest of the laws. The senate, finding them favorable to the 
plebeians, forced the decemvirs to resign, introduced into 
the two remaining tables regulations obnoxious to the com- 
mon people, and then endeavored to restore the consular 
government without the tribuneship. The plebs a second 
time seceded to the Sacred Mount, and the senate was forced 
to reinstate the tribunes.^ 

The Laws of the Twelve Tables remained as the 
grand result of the decemviral legislation. They were 
engraved on blocks of brass or ivory, and hung up in the 

1 The account of this transaction given in Livy's History is doubtless largely 
legendary. The story runs as follows: Three ambassadors were appointed to visit 
Athens (this was during the " Age of Pericles"), and examine the laws of Solon. On 
their return the decemvirs were chosen. They were to be supreme, and the consuls, 
tribunes, etc., resigned. The new rulers did admirably during one term, and com- 
pleted ten tables of excellent laws that were adopted by the Assembly of Centuries. 
Decemvirs were therefore chosen for a second term. Appius Claudius was the most 
poi)iilar of the first body of decemvirs, and the only one reelected. Now all was 
quickly changed ; the ten men became at once odious tyrants, and Appius Claudius 
chief of all. Each of the decemvirs was attended by twelve lictors, bearing the 
fasces with the axes wherever he went in public. Two new tables of oppressive laws, 
coutirming the patricians in their hated privileges, were added to the former tables. 
, When the year expired the decemvirs called no new election, aud held their office in 
defiance of the senate and the people. No man's life was safe, and many leading 
persons fled from Rome. The crisis soon came. One day, seeing a beautiful maiden, 
the daughter of a plebeian named Virginius, crossing the Forum, Claudius resolved 
to make her his own. So he directed a client to seize her on the charge that she was 
tlie child of one of his slaves, and then to bring the case before the decemvirs for 
trial. Claudius, of course, decided in favor of his client. Thereupon Virginius drew 
his daughter one side from the judgment-seat as if to bid her farewell. Suddenly 
catching up a butcher's knife from a block near by, he plunged it into his daughter's 
heart, crying, "Thus only can 1 make thee free! " Then brandishing the red blade, 
he liastened to the camp and roused the soldiers, who marched to the city, breathing 
vengeance. As over the body of the injured Lucretia, so again over the corpse of the 
spotless Virginia, the populace swore that Rome should be free. The plebeians flocked 
out once more to the Sacred Mount. The decemvirs were forced to resign. The 
tribunes and consuls were restored to power. Appius, in despair, committed suicide. 
(The version of this story given in the text above is that of Ihne, the great Germap 
critic, in his new work on Early Roiiie.) 



218 ROME. [4513.0. 

Forum, where all could read them. Henceforth they con- 
stituted the foundation of the wiitten law of Rome, and 
every schoolboy, as late as Cicero's time, learned them by 
heart. 

Continued Triumph of the Plebs. — Step by step the 
plebeians pushed their demand for equal privileges with 
the patricians. First the Valerian and Horatian decrees 
(449 B. c), so caUed from the consuls who prepared them, 
made the resolutions passed by the plebeians in the Assembly 
of the Tribes binding equally upon the patricians. Next* 
the Canuleian decree (445 b. c.) abolished the law against in- 
termarriage. The patricians, finding that the plebeians were 
likely to get hold of the consulship, compromised by abol- 
ishing that office, and by choosing, through the Assembly of 
Centuries, from patricians and plebeians alike, three Diilitary 
trihimes with consular powers. But the patricians did not 
act in good faith, and by innumerable arts managed to cir- 
cumvent the plebs, so that during the next fifty years (until 
400 B. c.) there were twenty elections of consids instead of 
military tribunes, and when military tribuues were chosen 
they were always patricians. Meanwhile they also secured 
the appointment of ceyisors, to be chosen from their ranks 
exclusively, who took the census, classified the people, and 
supervised public morals. Thus they constantly strove to 
offset the new plebeian power. So vindictive was the strug- 
gle that the nobles did not shrink from murder to remove 
promising plebeian candidates.^ But the plebs held firm, 

1 Tlins the Fabii, a powerful patrician house, having taken the side of the plebs, 
and finding that tliey could not thereafter live in peace at Rome, left the city, and 
founded an outpost on the Cremera, below Veil, where thej' could still serve their 
country. This little body of three hundred and six soldiers— including the Fabii, their 
clients and dependants— sustained for two years the full brunt of the Veientine war. 
At length they were enticed into an ambuscade, and all were slain except one little 
boy, the ancest<»r of the Fabius afterward so famou.s. During the massacre the con- 
sular army was neai" by, but patrician hate would not peiiuit a rescue. 

Again, during a severe fapaine at Home (440 p. C.), a rich plebeian, uametl Spqriqs 



367 B.C.] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 219 

and finally secured the famous lAcinian Rogation (367 B. c), 
which ordered, — 

I. That, in case of debts on wliich interest had been met, the sura of tlie interest 
paid sliould be deducted from the principal, and the remainder become due in three 
successive years. (This bankrupt law was designed to aid the poor, now overwhelmed 
with debt, and so in the power of the rich creditor.) 

II. That no citizen should hold more than five hundred jugera (about three hun- 
dred and twenty acres) of the public land, and should not feed on the public pastures 
more than a limited number of cattle, under penalty of fine. 

III. That henceforth consuls, not consular tribunes, should be elected, and that 
one of the two consuls must be plebeian. 

IV. That instead of two patricians being chosen to keep the Sibylline books (p. 209), 
there should be ten men, taken equally from both orders. 

For years after its passage the patricians struggled to pre- 
vent the decree from going into effect. But the common 
people finally won. They never lost the ground they had 
gained, and secured, in rapid succession, the dictatorship, the 
censorship, the praetorship, and (300 B. c.) the right to be 
pontiff and augur. Rome at last, nearly two centuries 
after the republic began, possessed a democratic govern- 
ment. "Civil concord," says Weber, "to which a temple 
was dedicated at this time, brought with it a period of civic 
virtue and heroic greatness." 

Wars -with Neighboring Tribes. — ^While this long 
civil contest was raging within the walls of Rome, her 
armies were fighting without, striving to regain her lost 
supremacy over Latium, and sometimes for the very exist- 
ence of the city. There was a constant succession of wars ^ 



Maelius, sold grain to the poor at a very low rate. The patricians, finding that he 
was likely to be a successful candidate for office, accused him of wishing to be king, 
and as he refused to appear before his enemies for trial, Ahala, the master of 
horse, slew him in the Forum with his own hand. 

1 Various beautiful legends cluster around these eventful wars, and they have 
attained almost the dignity, though we cannot tell liow much they contain of the 
truth, of history. 

CORIOLANUS.— While the Romans were besieging Corioli, the Volscians made a 
sally, but were defeated. In the eagerness of the pursuit, Caius Marcius followed the 
enemy inside the gates, which were closed upon him. But with his good sword he 
liewed his way back, and let in the Bomans. So the city was taken, and the hero 



220 



ROME. 



[390 B. C. 



with tlie Latins, ^quians, Volscians, Etruscans, Veientes, 
and Samnites. Connected with these wars are the names, 
famous in Roman legend, of Coriolanus, Cincinnatus, and 
Camillus. 

The Gallic Invasion. — In the midst of these contests 
a horde of Gauls crossed the Apennines, and spread like a 
devastating flood over central Italy. Rome was taken, and 
nearly aU the city burned (390 B. c.)- The invaders con- 
received tlie name Coriolanus. Afterward there was a famine at Rome, and, grain 
arriving from Sicily, Cains would not sell any to the plebs unless they would submit 
to the patricians. Thereupon the tribunes sought to bring him to trial, but he lied, 
and took refuge among the Volsci. Soon after, he returned at the head of a gieat 
army, and laid siege to Rome. The city was in peril. As a final resort, his mother, 
wife, and children, with many of the chief women, clad in the deepest niourning, 
■went forth and fell at his feet. Unable to resist their entreaties, Coriolanus ex- 
claimed, " Mother, thou hast saved Rome, but lost thy son." Having given the order 
to retreat, he is said to have been slain by the angiy Volsci. 




CINCINNATUS RECEIVING THE DICTATORSHIP. 

Cincinnatus.— One day news came that the iEquians had surrounded the consul 
Minucius and his army in a deep valley, whence they could not escape, The only one 
in Rome deemed fit to meet this emergency was Titus Quinctius, surnamed Cincin- 
natus (the Curly-haired), who was now declared dictator. The oflBcers who went to 



390B.O.] THE POLITICAL HISTORY, 221 

sented to retire only on the payment of a heavy ]:'ansom. 
So deep an impression was made upon the Romans by the 
size, strength, courage, and enormous number of these bar- 
barians, that they thenceforth called a war with the Gauls 
a tumult, and kept in the treasury a special fund for such a 
catastrophe. 

The Final Effect of all these wars was beneficial to 
Rome. The plebeians, who formed the strength of her 
army, frequently carried their point against the patricians 
by refusing to fight until they got their rights. These long 
struggles, too, matured the Roman energy, and developed 

announce his appointment found him plowing on his little farm of four acres, 
which he tilled himself. He called for his toga, that he might receive the commands 
of the senate with due respect, when he was at once hailed dictator. Repairing to 
the city, he assembled fresh troops, bidding each man carry twelve wooden stakes. 
That very night he surrounded the -^quiaiis, dug a ditch, and made a palisade about 
their camp. Minucius, hearing the Roman war-cry, rushed up and fell upon the 
enemy with all his might. When day broke, the ^quians found themselves hemmed 
in, and were forced to surrender and to pass under the yoke. Ciucinnatus, on his 
return, was awarded a golden crown. Haviug saved his country, he resigned his 
office and went back to his plow again, content with the quiet of his rustic home. 

THE Siege of Veii— the Troy of Roman legend— lasted ten years. Before that 
the Roman wars consisted mainly of mere forays into an enemy's country. Now the 
troops remained summer and winter, and for the first time received regular pay. In 
the seventh year of the siege. Lake Albauus, though in the heat of summer, over- 
flowed its banks. The Delphic oracle declared that Veii would not fall until the lake 
was dried up, whereupon the Roman army cut a tunnel through the solid rock to 
convey the surplus water over the neighboring fields. Still the city did not yield. 
Camillus, having been appointed dictator, dug a jjassage under the wall. One day the 
king of Veii was about to offer a sacrifice, when the soothsayer told him that the city 
should belong to him who slew the victim. The Romans, who were beneath, heard 
these words, and, forcing their way through, hastened to the shrine, and Camillus 
completed the sacrifice. The gates were tlirown open, and the Roman army, rushing 
in, overpowered all opposition. 

THE City of Falerii had aided the Veientes. When Camillus, bent on revenge, 
appeared before the place, a schoolmaster secretly brought into the Roman camp his 
pupils, the children of the chief men of Falerii. Camillus, scorning to receive the 
traitor, tied his hands behind his back, and, giving whips to the boys, bade them flog 
their master back into the city. The Falerians, moved by such magnanimity, sur- 
rendered to the Romans. Camillus entered Rome in a chariot drawn by white horses, 
and having his face colored with veimilion, as was the custom when the gods were 
borne in procession. Unfortunately, he offended the plebs by ordering each man to 
restore one tenth of his booty for an offering to Apollo. He was accused of pride, 
and of appropriating to his own use the bronze gates of Veii. Forced to leave the 
city, he went out praying that Rome might yet need his help. That time soon came. 
Five years after, the Gauls defeated the Romans at 

THE River Allia, where the slaughter was so great that the anniversary of the 



222 ROME. [390 b. c. 

the Roman character in all its stern^ unfeehng, and yet 
heroic strength. 

After the Gallic invasion Rome was soon rebuilt. The sur- 
rounding nations having suffered still more severely from 
the northern barbarians, and the Gauls being now looked 
upon as the common enemy of Italy, Rome came to be con- 
sidered the common defender. The plebs, in rebuilding 
their ruined houses and buying tools, cattle, and seed, were 
reduced to greater straits than ever before (unless after the 
expulsion of the Etruscan kings) ; and to add to their bur- 
dens a double tribute was imposed by the government, in 

battle became a black day in the Roman calendar. The wreck of the army took refuge 
in Veil. The people of Rome fled for their lives. The young patricians garrisoned 
the citadel; and the gray-haired senators, devotiug themselves as an offering to the 
gods, put on their robes, and, sitting in their ivory chairs of magistracy, awaited 
death. The barbarians, hurrying through the deserted streets, at length came to the 
Forum. For a moment tliey stood amazed at the sight of those solemn figures. Then 
one of the Gauls put out his hand reverently to stroke the white beard of an aged 
senator, when the indignant Roman, revolting at the piofanation, felled him with his 
staff. The spell was broken, and the senators were ruthlessly massacred. 

The Siege of the Capitol lasted for months. One night a party of Gauls clambered 
np the steep ascent, and one of them reached the highest ledge of the rock. Just 
then some sacred geese in the Temple of Juno began to cry and flap their wings. 
Marcus Manlius, aroused by tlie noise, rushed out, saw the peiil, and dashed the 
foremost Gaul over the precipice. Other Romans rallied to his aid, and the imminent 
peril was arrested. Finally the Gauls, weary of the siege, offered to accept a ran- 
som of a thousand pounds of gold. This sum was raised from the temple treasures 
and the ornaments of the Roman women. As they were weighing the articles, the 
Romans complained of the scales being false, when Brennus, the Gallic chief, threw 
in his heavy sword, insolently exclaiming, " Woe to the vanquished ! " At that 
moment Camillus strode in at the head of an army, crying, " Rome is to be bought 
with iron, not gold! " drove out the enemy, and not a man escaped to tell how low 
the city had fallen on that eventful day. When the Romans returned to their devas- 
tated homes, they were at first of a mind to leave Rome, and occupy the empty dwell- 
ings of Veii ; but a lucky omen prevailed on them to remain. Just as a senator was 
rising to speak, a centurion relieving guard gave the command, " Plant your colors ; 
this is the best place to stay in." The senators rushed forth, shouting, " The gods 
have spoken ; we obey ! " The people caught the enthusiasm, and cried out, " Rome 
forever ! " 

Marcus Manlius, who saved the Capitol, befriended the people in the distress 
which followed the Gallic invasion. One day, seeing a soldier dragged off to prison 
for debt, he paid tlie amount and released the man, at the same time swearing that 
while he had any property left, no Roman should be imprisoned foi- debt. The patri- 
cians, jealous of his inttiience among tlie plebs, accused him of wishing to become 
king. He was brouglit to trial in the Campus Martins ; but tlie hero pointed to the 
spoils of thirty warriors wliom he had slain; forty distinctions won in battle; his 
innumerable scars , and, above all, to the Capitol he had saved. His enemies, finding 



396 B.C.] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 223 

order to replace the sacred gold used to buy off the Gauls. 
But this very misery soon led to the Licinian Rogations 
(p. 219), and so to the growth of liberty. Thus the plebs 
got a consul twenty-four years after the Gauls left, just as 
they got the tribunes fifteen years after the Etruscans left ; 
the succeeding ruin both times being followed by a triumph 
of democracy. 

The CapUire of Yeii (396 B. c.) gave the Romans a foothold 
beyond the Tiber ; and, only three years after the Gallic in- 
vasion, four new tribes, carved out of the Veientine land, 
were added to the republic. 

a conviction in that place impossible, adjourned to a grove where the Capitol could 
not be seen, and there the man who had saved Rome was sentenced to death, and at 
once hurled from the Tarpeian Rock. 

QuiNTUS Cuimus.— Not long after the Licinian Rogations were passed, Rome 
was afflicted by a plague, in which Camillas died; by an overflow of the Tiber; and 
by an earthquake, which opened a great chasm in the Forum. The augurs de- 
clared that the gulf would not close until there were cast into it the most precious 
treasures; whereupon Quintus Curtius mounted his horse, and, riding at full speed, 
leaped into the abyss, declaring that Rome's best treasures were her brave men. 

The Battle of Mount Vesuvius (340 b. c.) was the chief event 6f the Latin 
war. Prior to this engagement the consul Manlius ordered that no one should quit 
his post under pain of death. But his own son, provoked by the taunts of a Tusculan 
officer, left the ranks, slew his opponent in single combat, and brought the bloody 
spoils to his father. The stern parent ordered him to be at once belieaded by the 
lictor, in the presence of the army. During the battle which followed, the Romans 
were on the point of yielding, when Decius, the plebeian consul, who had promised, 
in case of defeat, to otter himself to the infernal gods, fulfilled his vow. Calling the 
pontifex maxim us, he repeated the form devoting the foe and himself to death, and 
then, wrapping his toga about him, leaped upon his horse, and dashed into the thickest 
of the fight. His death inspired the Romans with fresh hope, and scarce one fourth 
of the Latins escaped from that bloods'^ field. 

Battle of the Caudine Forks.— During the second Samnite war there arose 
among the Samnites a famous captain named Caius Pontius. By a stratagem he en- 
ticed the Roman army into the Caudine Forks, in the neighborhood of Caudium. High 
mountains here inclose a little i)lain, having at each end a passage through a narrow 
defile. When the Romans were fairly in the basin, the Samnites suddenly appeared 
in both gorges, and forced the consuls to surrender witli four legions. Pontius, having 
sent his prisoners under the yoke, furnished them with wagons for the wounded, and 
food for their journey, and then released them on certain conditions of peace. The 
senate refused to ratify the terms, and ordered the consuls to be delivered up to the 
Samnites, but did not send back the soldiers. Pontius replied that if the senate would 
not make peace, then it should place the army back in the Caudine Forks. The 
Romans, who rarely scrupled at any conduct that promised their advantage, con- 
tinued the war. But when, twenty-nine years later, Pontius was captured by Fabius 
Maximus, that brave Samnite leader was disgracefully put to death as the triumphal 
chariot of the victor ascended to the CapitoL 



224 ROME. [337 B.C. 

The final result of the Latm war (340-338 B. c.) was 
to dissolve the old Latin League,^ and to merge the cities of 
Latium, one by one, into the Roman state. 

The three Samnite wars (343-290 b. c.) occupied half a 
century, with brief intervals, and were most obstinately 
contested. The long-doubtful struggle culminated at the 
great battle of Sentinum, in a victory over the combined 
Samnites, Gauls, and Greek colonists. Samnium became a 
subject-ally. Eorne was now mistress of central Italy. 

War with Pyrrhus (280-276 b. c.).— The rich city 
of Tarentum, in southern Italy, had not joined the Samnite 
coalition. Rome had therefore made a treaty with her, 
promising not to send ships of war past the Lacinian Prom- 
ontory. But, having a garrison in the friendly city of Thurii, 
the senate ordered a fleet to that place ; so one day, while the 
people of Tarentum were seated in their theater witnessing 
a play, they suddenly saw ten Roman galleys sailing upon 
the forbidden waters. The audience in a rage left their 
seats, rushed down to the shore, manned some ships, and, 
pushing out, sank four of the Roman squadron. The senate 
sent ambassadors to ask satisfaction. They reached Taren- 
tum, so says the legend, during a feast of Bacchus. Postu- 
mius, the leader of the envoys, made so many mistakes in 
talking Greek, that the people laughed aloud, and, as he was 
leaving, a buffoon threw mud upon his white toga. The 
shouts only increased when Postumius, holding up his soiled 
robe, cried, "This shall be washed in torrents of your 
blood ! " War was now inevitable. Tarentum,^ nnable to 



1 The Latin League (p. 216) was dissolved in the same year (338 B. c.) with the 
battle of Chgeronea (p. 149). 

2 The Greek colonists retained the pride, though they had lost the simplicity, of 
their ancestors. They were effeminate to the last degree. " At Tarentum there were 
not enough days in the calendar on which to hold the festivals, and at Syharis they 
killed all the cocks lest they should disturb the inhabitants in their sleep." 



280 b. c] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 225 

resist the " barbarians of the Tiber/' appealed to the mother 
country for help. Pyrrhus, King of Epirus, came over with 
twenty-five thousaind soldiers and twenty elephants. For 
the first time the Roman legion (p. 271) met the dreaded 
Macedonian phalanx. In vain the Roman soldiers sought 
to break through the bristling hedge, with their swords 
hewing off the pikes, and with their hands bearing them 
to the ground. To complete their discomfiture, Pyrrhus 
launched his elephants upon their weakened ranks. At 
the sight of that "new kind of oxen," the Roman cavalry 
fled in dismay. 

Pyrrhus won a second battle in the same way. He then 
crossed over into Sicily to help the Greeks against the Car- 
thaginians. When he returned, two years later, while at- 
tempting to surprise the Romans by a night attack, his 
troops lost their way, and the next morning, when w^eary 
with the march, they were assailed by the enemy. The 
once-di'eaded elephants were frightened back by fire-brands, 
and driven through the Grecian lines. Pyrrhus was defeated, 
and, having lost nearly all his army, re turned to Epirus.' 
The Greek colonies, deprived of his help, were subjugated in 
rapid succession. 

. 1 Many romantic incidents are told of this war. As Pyrrhus walked over the 
battle-field and saw the Romans lying all with wounds in front, and their countenances 
stern in death, he cried out, "With such soldiers I could conquer the world!"— 
Cineas, whom Pyrrhus sent to Rome as an ambassador, returned, sajung, "The city is 
like a temple of the gods, and the senate an assembly of kings." Fabricius, who 
came to Pyrrhus's camp on a similar mission, was a sturdy Roman, who worked his 
own farm, and loved integrity and honor more than aught else, save his country. 
The Grecian leader was surprised to find in this haughty barbarian that same great- 
ness of soul that had once made the Hellenic character so famous. He offered him 
" more gold than Rome had ever possessed" if he would enter his service, but Fabri- 
cius replied that "poverty, with a good name, is better than wealth." Afterward 
the physician of Pyrrluis offered to poison the king; but the indignant Roman sent 
back the traitor in irons. Pyrrhus, not to be outdone in generosity, set free all his 
captives, saying that " it was easier to turn the sun from its course than Fabricius 
from the path of honor."— Dentatus, the consul wlio defeated Pyrrlius, was offered 
by the grateful senate a tract of land. He replied that he already had seven acres, 
and that was sufficient for any citizen. 



226 ROME. [265 B.C. 

Rome was now mistress of peninsular Italy. She was ready 
to begin her grand career of foreign conquest. 

The Roman Government in Italy was that of one city 
supreme over many cities. Rome retained the rights of de- 
claring war, making peace, and coining money, but permitted 
her subjects to manage their local affairs. All were requu'ed 
to furnish soldiers to fight under the eagles of Rome. There 
were three classes of inhabitants, — Roman citizens, Latins, 
and Italians. The Roman citizens were those who occupied 
the territory of Rome proper, including others upon whom 
this franchise had been bestowed. They had the right to 
meet in the Forum to enact laws, elect consuls, etc. The 
Latins had only a few of the rights of citizenship, and the 
ItaUans or allies none. As the power of Rome grew, Roman 
citizenship acquired a might and a meaning (Acts xxii. 25 ; 
xxiii. 27 J XXV. 11-21) which made it eagerly sought by every 
person and city ; and the prize constantly held out, as a 
reward for special service and devotion, was that the Italian 
could be made a Latin, and the Latin a Roman. 

The Romans were famous road-builders, and the great 
national highways which they constructed throughout theu* 
territories did much to tie them together (p. 282). By 
their use Rome kept up constant communication with all 
parts of her possessions, and could quickly send her legions 
wherever wanted. 

A portion of the land in each conquered state was given 
to Roman colonists. They became the patricians in the 
new city, the old inhabitants counting only as plebs. Thxis 
little Romes were built aU over Italy. The natives looked 
up to these settlers, and, hoping to obtain similar rights, 
quickly adopted their customs, institutions, and language. 
So the entire peninsula rapidly assumed a uniform national 
character. 



264B.C.] THE POliITIOAL HISTORY. 227 



THE PUNIC WARS. 

Carthage (p. 76) was now the great naval and colonizing 
power of the western Mediterranean. She had established 
some settlements in western Sicily, and these were almost 
constantly at war with the Greeks on the eastern coast. As 
Sicily lay between Carthage and Italy, it was natural that 
two such aggressive powers as the Carthaginians and the 
tlomans should come to blows on that island. 

First Punic War (264-241 b. c). — Some pirates seized 
Messana, the nearest city to Italy, and, being threatened by 
the Carthaginians and the Syracusans, asked help of Rome, 
in order to retain their ill-gotten possessions. On this 
wretched pretext an army was sent into Sicily. The Car- 
thaginians were driven back, and Hiero, king of Syracuse, 
was forced to make a treaty with Rome. Agrigentum, an 
important naval depot belonging to Carthage, was then cap- 
tured, in spite of a large army of mercenary soldiers which 
the Carthaginians sent to its defense. 

Rome^s First Fleet (260 b. c.).^ — The Roman senate, not 
content with this success, was bent on contesting with Car- 
thage the supremacy of the sea. One hundred and thirty 
vessels were accordingly built in sixty days, a stranded 
Phoenician galley being taken as a model. To compensate 
the lack of skilled seamen, the ships were provided with 
drawbridges, so that coming at once to close quarters their 
disciplined soldiers could rush upon the enemies' deck, and 
decide the contest by a hand-to-hand fight. They thus beat 

1 From punicus, an adjective derived from Pceni, the Latin form of the word 
Phoenicians. 

2 The Romans began to construct a fleet as early as 338 B. c, and in 267 we read 
of the questors of tlie navy ; but the vessels were small, and Rome was a land-power 
until 260 B. c. 



256B.C.] THE POLITICAL HirfTOBr. 229 

the Carthaginians in two great naval battles within four 
years. 

Romans cross the Sea. — Under Regulus the Romans then 
crossed the Mediterranean, and " carried the war into Africa." 
The natives, weary of the oppressive rule of the Carthagin- 
ians, welcomed their dehverers. Carthage seemed about to 
fall, when the presence of one man turned the tide. Xan- 
thippus, a Spartan general, led the Carthaginians to victory, 
destroyed the Roman army, and captured Regulus.^ 

After this the contest dragged on for several years ; but a 
signal victory near Fanormus, in Sicily, gave the Romans 
the ascendency in that island, and finally a great naval defeat 
off the ^gu'saB Islands cost the Carthaginians the empire 
of the sea. 

Effects. — Carthage was forced to give up Sicily, and pay 
thirty-two hundred talents of silver (about four million 
dollars) toward the war expenses. The Temple of Janus 
was shut for the first time since the days of Numa (p. 207). 

Eoine^s First Frovince was Sicily. This was governed, like 
all the possessions which she afterward acquired outside of 
Italy, by magistrates sent each year from Rome. The peo- 
ple, being made not aUies but subjects, were required to pay 
an annual tribute. 

1 It is said that Regulus, wliile At the height of his success, asked permission to 
return home to his little farm, as a slave had run away with the tools, aud his family 
was likely to suffer with want during his absence. After his capture, the Caitha- 
ginians sent him to Rome with proposals of peace, making him swear to return in 
case the conditions were not accepted. On his arrival, he refused to enter the city, 
saying that he was no longer a Roman citizen, hut only a Carthaginian slave. Having 
stated the terms of the proposed peace, to the amazement of all, he urged their re- 
jection as unworthy of the glory and honor of Rome. Then, without visiting his 
home, he turned away from weeping wife and children, and went back to his prison 
again. The enraged Carthaginians cut off his eyelids, and exposed him to the burn- 
ing rays of a tropic sun, and then thrust him into a barrel studded with sharp naUs. 
So perished this martyr to his word and his country.— Historic research throws 
doubt on the truth of this instance of Punic cruelty, and asserts that the story was 
invented to excuse the barbarity with which the wife of Regulus treated some Car- 
thaginian captives who fell into her hands ; but the name of Regulus lives as the per- 
sonification of sincerity and patriotic devotion. 



230 ROME. [218 b. c. 

Second Punic War (218-201 b. c). — During the ensu- 
ing peace of twenty-three years, Hamilcar (surnamed Barca, 
lightning), the great statesman and general of Carthage, 
built up an empire in southern Spain, and trained an army 
for a new struggle with Rome. He hated that city mth a 
oerfect hatred. When he left home for Spain, he took with 
him his son Hannibal, a boy nine years old, having first 
made him swear at the altar of Baal always to be the enemy 
of the Romans. That youthful oath was never forgotten, 
and Hannibal, like his father, had but one purpose, — to 
humble his country's rival. When twenty-six years of age, 
he was made commander-in-chief of the Carthaginian army. 
Pushing the Punic power northward, he captured Sagimtum. 
As that city was her ally, Rome promptly declared war 
against Carthage.-"- On the receipt of this welcome news, 
Hannibal, with the daring of genius, resolved to scale the 
Alps, and carry the contest into Italy. 

Invasion of Italy. — In the spring of the year 218 B. c. he 
set out ^ from New Carthage. Through hostile tribes, over 
the swift Rhone, he pressed forward to the foot of the Alps. 
Here dangers multiplied. The mountaineers rolled down 
rocks upon his column, as it wearily toiled up the steep as- 
cent. Snow blocked the way. At times the crack of a whip 
would bring down an avalanche from the impending heights. 
The men and horses slipped on the sloping ice-fields, and slid 
over the precipices into the awful crevasses. New roads had 
to be cut through the sohd rock by hands benumbed with 

1 An embassy came to Carthage demanding that Hannibal should be surrendered. 
This being refused, M. Fabius, folding up his toga as if it contained something, 
exclaimed, "I bring you peace or war; take which you will!" The Carthaginians 
answered, " Give us which you wish ! " Shaking open his toga, the Eoman haughtily 
replied, " I give j'ou war ! "— " So let it be ! " shouted the assembly. 

2 Before starting on this expedition, Hannibal went with liis immediate attendants 
to Gades, and offered sacrifice in tlie temples for the success of the great work to 
which he had been dedicated eighteen years before, and to which he had been looking 
forward so long. 



218 B. c] 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 



231 



cold^ and weakened by scanty rations. 
Wlien at last he reached the smiling plains 
of Italy, only twenty-six thousand men were 
left of the one hundred and two thousand 
with whom he began the perilous march five 
months before. 




Jioff/is oi In'Jna, 

nft — All i\ iiiii .il Ihe 
]\\i \ Tulmi III I)< « 1 m- 
1m I II.iiiMili.il Iniind 
11m' Ii<>Tii.ni>«. iimler 
K^Lmpiomuj^j i'«i<l} to 
dispute his progress, 
stormy morning, he sent the 
Numidian cavalry over to 



232 ROME. [218 B.C. 

make a feigned attack on the enemy's camp. The Romans 
fell into the snare, and pursued the horsemen back across 
the river. When the legions, stiff with cold and faint 
with hunger, emerged from the icy waters, they found the 
Carthaginian army drawn up to receive them. Undismayed 
by the sight, they at once joined battle ; but, in the midst 
of the struggle, Hannibal's brother Mago feU. upon their 
rear with a body of men that had been hidden in a reedy 
ravine near by. The Romans, panic-stricken, broke and 
fled. 

The fierce Gauls now flocked to Hannibal's camp, and 
remained his active aUies during the rest of the war. 

The next year Hannibal moved southward.^ One day in 
June, the consul Flaminius was eagerly pursuing him along 
the banks of Lahe Trasimenus. Suddenly, through the mist, 
the Carthaginians poured down from the heights, and put the 
Romans to rout.^ 

Fabius was now appointed dictator. Keeping on the 
heights where he could not be attacked, he followed Hanni- 
bal everywhere,^ cutting off his supplies, but never hazarding 
a battle. The Romans became impatient at seeing their 
country ravaged while their army remained inactive, and 
Varro, the consul, offered battle on the plain of Camice. 
Hannibal drew up the Carthaginians in the shape of a half- 
moon having the convex side toward the enemy, and tipped 

1 In the low flooded grounds along the Amo the army suffered fearfully. Hanni- 
bal himself lost an eye by inflammation, and tradition says that his life was saved 
by the last remaining elephant, which carried liim out of the swamp. 

2 So fierce was this struggle that none of the combatants noticed the shock of a 
severe eartliquake which occurred in the midst of the battle. 

3 While Hannibal was ravaging the rich plains of Campania, the wary Fabius 
seized the passes of the Apennines, through which Hannibal must recross into Sam- 
nium with his booty. The Carthaginian was apparently caught in the trap. But his 
mind was fertile in devices. He fastened torches to the horns of two thousand oxen, 
and sent men to drive tliem up the neighboring heights. Tlie Romans at the defiles, 
thinking the Cartliaginians were trying to escape over the hills, ran to the defensa 
Hannibal quickly seized the passes, and marched through with his army. 



216 b. 0.] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 233 

the horns of the crescent with his veteran cavaby. The 
massive legions quickly broke through his weak center. But 
as they pressed forward in eager pursuit, his terrible horse- 
men fell upon their rear. Hemmed in on all sides, the 
Romans could neither fight nor flee. Twenty-one tribunes, 
eighty senators, and over seventy thousand men, fell in that 
horrible massacre. After the battle, Hannibal sent to Car- 
thage over a peck of gold rings, — the ornaments of Roman 
knights. At Rome all was dismay. " One fifth of the cit- 
izens able to bear arms had fallen within eighteen months, 
and in every house there was mourning." All southern 
Italy, including Capua, the city next in importance to the 
capital, joined Hannibal. 

HannihaVs Reverses. — The tide of Hannibal's victories, 
however, ebbed from this time. The Roman spirit rose in 
the hour of peril, and, while struggling at home for exist- 
ence, the senate sent armies into Sicily, Greece, and Spain. 
The Latin cities remained true, not one revolting to the Car- 
thaginians. The Roman generals had learned not to fight 
in the open field, where Hannibal's cavalry and genius were 
so fatal to them, but to keep behind waUs, since Hannibal 
had no skill in sieges, and his army was too small to take 
their strongholds. Hannibal's brother Hasdrubal was busy 
fighting the Romans in Spain, and could send him no aid. 
The Carthaginians also were chary of Hannibal, and re- 
fused him help. 

For thirteen years longer Hannibal remained in Italy, but 
he was at last driven into Brutium, — the toe of the Italian 
boot. Never did his genius shine more brightly. He con- 
tinually saUied out to protect his alUes, or to plunder and 
devastate. Once he went so near Rome that he hurled a 
javelin over its walls. Nevertheless, and in spite of his 
efforts, Capua was retaken. Syracuse promised aid, but was 



234 ROME. [212 b. C. 

captured by the Roman army.^ Hasdrubal finally managed 
to get out of Spain and cross the Alps, but at the Metaiirus '^ 
(207 B. c.) he was routed and slain. The first notice Hannibal 
had of his brother's approach was when Hasdrubal's head 
was thrown into the Carthaginian camp. At the sight of 
this ghastly memorial, Hannibal exclaimed, ^' Ah, Carthage, 
I behold thy doom ! " 

Hannibal Recalled. — P. Scipio, who had already expelled 
the Carthaginians from Spain, now carried the war into 
Africa. Carthage was forced to summon her great general 
from Italy. He came to her defense, but met the first defeat 
of his life in the decisive battle of Zama. On that fatal field 
the veterans of the Italian wars fell, and Hannibal himself 
gave up the struggle. Peace was granted Carthage on her 
paying a crushing tribute, and agreeing not to go to war 
without the permission of Rome. Scipio received the name 
Africanus, in honor of his triumph. 

Fate of Hannibal. — On the return of peace, Hannibal, 
with singular wisdom, began the reformation of his native 
city. But his enemies, by false representations at Rome, 
compelled him to quit Carthage, and take refuge at the 
court of Anti^ochus (p. 237). When at length his patron 
was at the feet of their common enemy, and no longer able 
to protect him, Hannibal fled to Bithynia, where, finding 
himself still pursued by the vindictive Romans, he ended his 

1 The siege of Syracuse (214-212 b. c.) is famous for the genius displayed in its 
defense by the mathematician Archimedes. He is said to have fired the Roman fleet 
by means of immense burning-glasses, and to have contrived macliines that, reaching 
huge arras over the walls, grasped and overturned the galleys. The Romans became 
so timid that they would " flee at the sight of a stick thrust out at them." When the 
city was finally taken by storm, Marcellus gave orders to spare Archimedes. But a 
soldier, rushing into the philosopher's study, found an old man, who, ignoring liia 
drawn sword, bade him "Noli turbare circulos meos" (Do not disturb my circles). 
Enraged by his indifference, the Roman slew him on the spot. 

2 This engagement, wliich decided the issue of Hannibal's invasion of Italy, is 
reckoned among the nmst important in the history of the world (see Creasy's Fif 
teen Decisive Battles, p. 96). 



183 b. C] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 235 

days by taking poison, which he had carried about with 
him in a hollow ring. 

Third Punic War (149-146 b. c.).— Half a century 
passed, during which Carthage was slowly recovering her 
former prosperity. A strong party at Rome, however, was 
bent upon her destruction.^ On a slight pretense war was 
again declared. The submission of the Carthaginians was 
abject. They gave up three hundred hostages, and surren- 
dered their arms and armor. But when bidden to leave the 
city that it might be razed, they were driven to desperation. 
Old and young toiled at the forges to make new weapons. 
Vases of gold and silver, even the statues of the gods, were 
melted. The women braided their long hair into bow-strings. 
The Romans intrusted the siege to the younger Scipio.^ He 
captured Carthage after a desperate struggle. Days of con- 
flagration and plunder followed. The city, which had lasted 
over seven hundred years and numbered seven hundred 
thousand inhabitants, was utterly wasted. The Carthaginian 
territory was turned into the province of Africa.^ 

1 Prominent among these was Cato the Censor. This rough, stern man, with his 
red hair, projecting teeth, and coarse robe, was the sworn foe to luxury, and the per- 
sonification of the old Roman character. Cruel toward his slaves and revengeful 
toward his foes, he was yet rigid in morals, devoted to his country, and fearless in 
punishing crime. In the discharge of his duty as censor, rich furniture, jewels, and 
costly attire fell under his han. He even removed, it is said, the cold-water pipes lead- 
ing to the private houses. Jealous of any rival to Rome, he finished every speecli 
with the words, " Delenda est Carthago!" (Carthage must be destroyed!) In 
Plutarch's Lives (p. 177), Cato is the counterpart of Aristides (p. 128). 

2 (1) Publius Cornelius Scipio Africanus Major (p. 234) was the conqueror of 
Hannibal. (2) Publius Cornelius Scipio ^milianus Africanus Minor, tlie one spoken 
of in the text as the Destroyer of Carthage, was the son of Lucius ^milius PauUus, 
the conqueror of Macedon (p. 236) ; he was adopted by P. Scipio, the son of Africanus 
Major. (3) Lucius Cornelius Scipio Asiaticus, who defeated Antiochus (p. 237), and 
hence received his last title, was the brother of Africanus Major. 

3 When Scipio beheld the ruin of Carthage, he is said to have burst into tears, and, 
turning to Polybius the historian, to have quoted the lines of Homer,— 

" The day will come when Troy shall sink in fire. 
And Priam's people with himself expire,"— 

and, reflecting on the mutatious of time, to have declared that Hector's words might 
yet prove true of Rome herself. 



236 ROME. [146 b. c. 

Rome was at last victor over her great rival. Events had 
decided that Europe was not to be given over to Punic civili- 
zation and the intellectual despotism of the East. 

Wars in Macedon and Greece.^ While Hannibal 
was hard-pressed in Italy he made a treaty with Philip, king 
of Macedon, and a descendant of Alexander. In the First 
War which ensued (214-207 B. c), not much of importance 
occurred, but Rome had begun to mix in Grecian affairs, 
which, according to her wont, meant conquest by and by. 

The Second War (200-197 b. c.) was brought about by 
PhUip attacking the Roman allies. The consul Flaminius 
now entered Greece, proclaiming himself the champion of 
Hellenic liberty. Transported with this thought, nearly 
aU Hellas ranged itself under the eagles (p. 257) of Rome. 
Philip was overthrown at the battle of CynoscephalcB 
(197 B. c), and forced to accept a most degrading peace. 

After Philip's death, his son Perseus was indefatigable in 
his efforts to restore Macedon to its old-time glory. 

The Third War (171-168 B.C.) culminated in the battle 
of Pydna, where the famous Roman general Paullus van- 
quished forever the cumbersome phalanx, and ended the 
Macedonian monarchy. One hundred and fifty-six years 
after Alexander's death, the last king of Macedon was led 
in triumph by a general belonging to a nation of which, 
probably, the Conqueror had scarcely heard. 

The Results of these wars were reaped within a brief period. 
The Federal Unions of Greece were dissolved. Macedon was 
divided into four commonwealths, and finally, under pre- 
tense of a rebellion, made a Roman province (146 b, c). In 
the same year that Carthage fell, Corinth,i the great seaport 

1 Mummius, the consul who took Corinth, which Cicero termed "The eye of 
Hellas," sent its wealth of statues and pictures to Rome. It is said, that, ignorant of 
the unique value of tliese works of art, he agreed with the captains of the vessels to 
furnish others in place of any they should lose on the voyage. One can but remem- 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 237 

of the eastern Mediterranean, was sacked, and Greece her- 
self, after being amused for a time with the semblance of 
freedom, was organized into the province of Achaia. 

Syrian War (192-190 b. c). — ^'Macedon and Greece 
proved easy stepping-stones for Rome to meddle in the affairs 
of Asia." At this time Antiochus the Great governed the 
kingdom of the Seleucidae (p. 155), which extended from 
the ^gean beyond the Tigris. His capital, Antioch, on the 
Orontes, was the seat of Greek culture, and one of the chief 
cities of the world. He was not unwilling to measure 
swords with the Romans, and received Hannibal at his court 
with marked honor. During the interval between the 
second and third Macedonian wars the ^tolians, thinking 
themselves badly used by the Romans, invited Antiochus to 
come over to their help. He despised the wise counsel and 
mihtary skill of Hannibal, and, appearing in Greece with 
only ten thousand men, was easily defeated by the Romans 
at Thermopylce. The next year, L. Scipio (note, p. 235) fol- 
lowed him into Asia, and overthrew his power on the field 
of Magnesia (190 B. c). 

The great empire of the Seleucidae now shrank to the 
kingdom of Syria. Though the Romans did not at present 
assume formal control of their conquest, yet, by a shrewd 
policy of weakening the powerful states, playing off small 
ones against one another, supporting one of the two rival fac- 
tions, and favoring their allies, they taught the Greek cities 
in Asia Minor to look up to the great central power on the 
Tiber just as, by the same tortuous course, they had led 
Greece and Macedon to do. Thus the Romans aided Per- 
gamus, and enlarged its territories, because its king helped 
them against Antiochus ; and in return, when Attains III. 

ber, however, that this ignorant plebeian maintained his honesty, and kept none of 
the rich spoils for himself. 



238 ROME. [133 b. c. 

died, he bequeathed to them his kingdom. Rome thus ac- 
quired her first Asiatic province (133 B. c). 

War in Spain. — After the captm-e of Carthage and 
Corinth, Rome continued her efforts to subdue Spain. The 
rugged nature of the countiy, and the bravery of the inhab- 
itants, made the struggle a doubtful one. The town of 
Ntimantia held out long against the younger Scipio (note, 
p. 235). Finally, in despair, the people set fire to the place, 
and threw themselves into the flames. When the Romans 
forced an entrance through the walls, they found silence and 
desolation within. Spain thus became a Roman province 
the same year that Attains died, and thirteen years after 
the fall of Carthage and Corinth. 

The Boman Empire (133 b. c.) now included southern 
Europe from the Atlantic to the Bosporus, and a part of 
northern Africa ; while Syria, Egypt, and Asia Minor wei'e 
practically its dependencies. The Mediterranean Sea was a 
'^ Roman lake," and Ronie tvas mistress of the civilized world. 
Henceforth her wars were principally with barbarians. 

Effect of these Conquests. — Italy had formerly been 
covered with little farms of a few acres each, which the in- 
dustrious, frugal Romans cultivated with their own hands. 
When Hannibal swept the country with fire and sword, he 
destroyed these comfortable rural homes throughout entire 
districts. The people, unable to get a living, flocked to 
Rome. There, humored, flattered, and fed by every dema- 
gogue who wished their votes, they sank into a mere mob. 
The Roman race itself was fast becoming extinct.^ It had 

1 "At the time when all the kings of the earth paid homage to the Romans, this 
people was becoming extinguished, consumed by the double action of eternal war, 
and of a devouring system of legislation ; it was disappearing from Italy. The Ro- 
man, passing his life in camps, beyond the seas, rarely returned to visit liis little field. 
He had in most cases, indeed, no land or shelter at all, nor auj' otlier domestic gods 
than tlie eagles of the legions An exchange was becoming established between Italy 
and the provinces Italy sent her children to die in distant hinds, and received in 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY. ' 239 

perished on its hundred battle-fields. Rome was inhabited 
by a motley population from all lands, who poorly filled the 
place of her ancient heroes. 

The captives in these various wars had been sold as slaves, 
and the nobles, who had secured most of the land, worked it 
by their unpaid labor. Everywhere in the fields were gangs 
of men whose only crime was that they had fought for their 
homes, tied together with chains ; and tending the flocks were 
gaunt, shaggy wretches, carrying the goad in hands that had 
once wielded the sword. 

The riches of Syracuse, Carthage, Macedonia, Greece, and 
Asia poured into Rome. Men who went to foreign wars 
as poor soldiers came back with enormous riches, — the 
spoils of sacked cities. The nobles were rich beyond every 
di'eam of republican Rome. But meanwhile the poor grew 
poorer yet, and the curse of poverty ate deeper into the 
state. 

A few wealthy families governed the senate and filled all 
the offices. Thus a new nobility, founded on money alone, 
had grown up and become all-powei'ful. It was customary 
for a candidate to amuse the people with costly games, and 
none but the rich could afford the expense. The consul, at 
the end of his year of office, was usually appointed governor 
of a province, where, out of an oppressed people, he could 
recompense himself for all his losses. To keep the Roman 
populace in good humor, he would send back gifts of grain, 
and, if any complaint were made of his injustice and robbery, 
he could easily bribe the judges and senators, who were 
anxious only for the same chance which he had. 

compensation millious of slaves. Thus a uew people succeeded to the absent or 
destroyed Roman ])eople. Slaves took the place of masters, proudly occupied the 
Forum, and in their fantastic saturnalia governed, by their decrees, the Latins and 
the Italians, who filled the legions. It was soon no longer a question where were the 
plebeians of Rome. Tliey had left their bones on every shore. Camps, urns, and 
immortal roads,— these were all that remained of them."— Michelet 



240 



ROME. 



In the early days of the republic the soldier was a citizen 
who went forth to fight his country's battles, and, returning 
home, settled down again upon his Uttle farm, contented 
and happy. Military life had now become a profession. 
Patriotism was almost a forgotten virtue, and the soldier 
fought for plunder and glory. In the wake of the army 
followed a crowd of venal traders, who bought up the booty ; 
contractors, who " farmed " the revenues of the provinces ; 
and usurers, who preyed on the necessities of all. These 
rich army-followers were known as knights {equites), since 
in the early days of Rome the richest men fought on horse- 
back. They rarely took part in any war, but only reaped 
its advantages. The presents of foreign kings were no 
longer refused at Rome ; her generals 
and statesmen demanded money wher- 
ever they went. Well might Scipio 
Africanus, instead of prayiug to the 




ROMAN SOLDIERS. 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 241 

gods, as was the custom, to increase the state, implore them 
to preserve it. 

In this general decadence the fine moral fiber of the nation 
lost its vigor. First the people left their own gods and took 
up foreign ones. As the ancients had no idea of one God 
for all nations, such a desertion of their patron deities 
was full of significance. It ended in a general skepticism 
and neglect of religious rites and worship. In addition, the 
Romans became cruel and unjust. Nothing showed this 
more clearly than their refusal to grant the Roman franchise 
to the Latin cities, which stood by them so faithfully during 
Hannibal's invasion. Yet there were great men in Rome, 
and the ensuing centuries were the palmiest of her history. 



THE CIVIL WARS. 

Now began a century of civil strife, during which the old 
respect for laws became weak, and parties obtained their end 
by bribery and bloodshed. 

The Gracchi. — The tribune Tiberius Gracchus,^ per- 
ceiving the peril of the state, secured a new agrarian law 
(p. 216), directing the public land to be assigned in small 
, farms to the needy, so as to give every man a homestead ; 
and, in addition, he proposed to divide the treasures of 
Attains among those who received land, in order to enable 
them to build houses and buy cattle. But the oligarchs 
aroused a mob by which Gracchus was assassinated. 

1 Cornelia, the mother of Tiberius and Caius Gracchus, was the daughter of Scipio 
Africanus the Elder (note, p. 235). Left a widow, she was offered marriage witli the 
king of Egypt, hut preferred to devote herself to the education of her children. 
When a rich friend once exhibited to her a cabinet of rare gems, she called in her 
two sons, saying, "These are my jewels." Her statue bore the inscription by which 
she wished to be known, " The mother of the Gracchi."— Tiberius was the grandson 
of the Conqueror of Hannibal, the son-in-law of Appius Claudius, and the brother-iif- 
law of the Destroyer of Carthage. 



242 ROME. [123 b. C. 

About ten years later his brother Caius tried to carry out 
the same reform by distributing grain to the poor at a 
nominal price (the "Roman poor-law")? hy choosing juries 
from the knights instead of the senators, and by planting 
in conquered territories colonies of men who had no work 
at home. All went well until he sought to confer the 
Roman franchise upon the Latins. Then a riot was raised, 
and Caius was killed by a faithful slave to prevent his falling 
into the hands of his enemies. 

With the Gracchi perished the freedom of the republic j 
henceforth the corrupt aristocracy was supreme. 

Jugurtha (118-104 b. c), having usurped the throne of 
Numidia, long maintained his place by conferring lavish 
bribes upon the senators. His gold conquered every army 
sent against him, and he declared that Rome itself could be 
had for money. He was finally overpowered by the consul 
Caius Marius/ and, after adorning the victor's triumph at 
Rome, was thrown into the Mamertine Prison to perish.^ 

The Cimbri and Teutones (113-101 b. c), the van- 
guard of those northern hosts that were yet to overrun the 
empire, were now moving south, half a million strong, 
spreading dismay and ruin in their track. Six different Ro- 
man armies tried in vain to stay their advance. At Arausio 
alone eighty thousand Romans fell. In this emergency, the 
senate appealed to Marius, who, contrary to law, was again 
and again reinstated consul. He annihilated the Teutones 
at AqiKB Sextiw (Aix) ; and, the next year, the Cimbri at 
VerceUcs, where the men composing the outer line of the 

1 Lticius Cornelius Sulla, the Roman questor (p. 243), captured Jugurtlia by- 
treachery. Claiming that he was the real hero of tliis war, he had a ring engraved 
which represented Jugurtlia's surrender to him. Marius and Sulla were henceforth 
bitter rivals. 

2 This famous dungeon is still shown the traveler at Rome. It is an underground 
vault, built of rough stones. The only opening is by a hole at the top. As Jugurtha, 
accustomed to the heat of an African sun, was lowered into this dismal grave, he 
exclaimed, with chattering teeth, "Ah, what a cold bath they are giving me ! " 



101B.C.] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 243 

barbarian army were fastened together with chains, the whole 
making a solid mass three miles square. The Roman broad- 
sword mercilessly hewed its way through this struggling 
crowd. The Gallic women, in despair, strangled their 
children, and then threw themselves beneath the wheels of 
their wagons. The very dogs fought to the death. 

Rome was saved in her second great peril from barbarians. 
Marius was hailed as the " third founder of the city." 

Social War (90-88 b. c). — Drusus, a tribune, having 
proposed that the Italians should be granted the coveted 
citizenship, was murdered the very day a vote was to be 
taken upon the measure. On hearing this, many of the 
Italian cities, headed by the Marsians, took up arms. The 
veteran legions, which had conquered the world, now faced 
each other on the battle-field. The struggle cost three hun- 
dred thousand lives. Houses were burned and plantations 
wasted as in Hannibal's time. In the end, Rome was forced 
to allow the Italians to become citizens. 

First Mithridatic War (88-84 b. c.).— Just before the 
close of this bloody struggle, news came of the massacre of 
eighty thousand Romans and Italians residing in the towns 
of Asia Minor. Mithridates the Great, king of Pontus, and 
a man of remarkable energy and genius, had proclaimed 
himself the deliverer of Asia from the Roman yoke, and 
had kindled the fires of insurrection as far westward as 
Greece. The war against the Pontic monarch was confided 
to SuUa, who stood at the head of the Roman aristocracy. 
But Marius, the favorite leader of the people, by unscrupu- 
lous means wrested the command from his rival. There- 
upon Sulla entered Rome at the head of the army. For 
the first time, civil war raged within the walls of the city. 
Marius was driven into exile. ^ Sulla then crossed into 

1 Marius, after many romantic adventures, was thrown into prison at Min 



244 ROME. [87 b. C. 

Greece. He carried on five campaigns, mainly at his private 
expense, and finally restored peace on the condition that 
Mithridates should give up his conquests and his fleet. 

Return of Marius. — Meanwhile Cinna, one of the two 
consuls at Rome, recalled Marius, and together they entered 
the city with a body of men composed of the very dregs of 
Italy. The nobles and the friends of Sulla trembled at this 
triumph of the democracy. Marius now took a fearful 
vengeance for all he had suffered. He closed the gates, and 
went about with a body of slaves, who slaughtered every 
man at whom he pointed his finger. The principal senators 
were slain. The high priest of Jupiter was massacred at the 
altar. The consul Octavius was struck down in his curule- 
chair. The head of Antonius, the orator, was brought to 
Marius as he sat at supper; he received it with joy, and 
embraced the murderer. Finally the monster had himself 
declared consul, now the seventh time. Eighteen days after, 
he died, " drunk with blood and wine " (86 b. c). 

Sulla's Proscriptions. — Three years passed, when the 
hero of the Mithridatic war returned to Italy with his vic- 
torious army. His progress was disputed by the remains of 
the Marian party and the Samnites, who had not laid down 
their arms since the social war (p. 243). Sulla, however, 
swept aside their forces, and soon all Italy was prostrate 
before him. It was now the turn for the plebeians and the 
friends of Marius to fear. As Sulla met the senate, cries 
were heard in the neighboring circus. The senators sprang 
from their seats in alarm. SuUa bade them be quiet, remark- 

turnsB. One day a Cimbrian slave entered his cell to put him to death. The old man 
turned upon him with flashing eye, and shouted, " Darest thou kill Caius Marius ! " 
The Gaul, frightened at the voice of his nation's destroyer, dropped his sword and 
fled. Marius was soon set free by the sympathizing people, whereupon he crossed 
into Africa. Receiving there an order from the praetor to leave tlie province, he sent 
back tlie well-known reply, "Tell Sextilius that you have seen Caius Marius sitting 
in exile among the ruins of Carthage." 



82 b. c] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 245 

ing, "It is only some wretches undergoing the punishment 
they deserve." The "wretches" were six thousand of the 
Marian party, who were butchered in cold blood. "The 
porch of Sulla's house/' says ColUer, "was soon full of 
heads." Daily proscription-lists were made out of those 
doomed to die, and the assassins were rewarded from the 
property of their victims. Wealth became a crime when 
murder was gain. " Alas ! " exclaimed one, " my villa is my 
destruction." In aU the disaffected Italian cities the same 
bloody work went on. Whole districts were confiscated to 
make room for colonies of Sulla's legions. He had himself 
declared perpetual dictator, — an office idle since the Punic 
wars (p. 232). He deprived the tribunes of the right to pro- 
pose laws, and sought to restore the " good old times " when 
the patricians held power, thus undoing the reforms of cen- 
turies. To the surprise of all, however, he suddenly retired 
to private life, and gave himseK up to luxurious ease. The 
civil wars of Marius and Sulla had cost Italy the lives of 
one hundred and fifty thousand citizens. 

Sertorius, one of the Marian party, betook himseK to 
Spain, gained the respect and confidence of the Lusitanians, 
established among them a miniature Roman republic, and 
for seven years defeated every army sent against him. Even 
Pompey the Great was held in check. Treachery at last 
freed Rome from its enemy, Sertorius being slain at a 
banquet. 

Gladiatorial War (73-71 b. c). — A party of gladiators 
under Spartacus, having escaped from a training-school at 
Capua, took refuge in the crater of Vesuvius. Thither 
flocked slaves, peasants, and pirates. Soon they were strong 
enough to defeat consular armies, and for three years to rav- 
age Italy from the Alps to the peninsula. Crassus finally, 
in a desperate brittle, killed the rebel leader, and put his fol- 



246 EOME. [71 B.C. 

lowers to fliglit. A body of five thousand, trying to escape 
into Gaul^ fell in with Pompey the Great as he was returning 
from Spain, and were cut to pieces.^ 

Pirates in these troublous times infested the Mediter- 
ranean, so as to interfere with trade and stop the supply of 
provisions at Rome. The whole coast of Italy was in con- 
tinual alarm. Parties of robbers landing dragged rich pro- 
prietors from their villas, and seized high officials, to hold 
them for ransom. Pompey, in a brilhant campaign of 
ninety days, cleared the seas of these buccaneers. 

Great Mithridatic War (74-63 b. c.).— During Sulla's 
life the Roman governor in Asia causelessly attacked Mithri- 
dates, but being defeated, and Sulla peremptorily ordering 
him to desist, this Second Mithridatic War soon ceased. 
The Third or Great War broke out after the dictator's 
death. The king of Bithynia having bequeathed his pos- 
sessions to the Romans, Mithridates justly dreaded this ad- 
vance of his enemies toward his own boundaries, and took 
up arms to prevent it. The Roman consul, Lucullus, de- 
feated the Pontic king, and drove him to the court of his 
son-in-law Tigranes, king of Armenia, who espoused his 
cause. Lucullus next overcame the alhed monarchs. Mean- 
while this wise general sought to reconcile the Asiatics to the 
Roman government by legislative reforms, by a mild and 
just rule, and especially by checking the oppressive taxation. 
The soldiers of his own army, intent on plunder, and the 
equites at Rome deprived of their profits, were incensed, and 
secured his recall. 

Pompey was now granted the power of a dictator in the 
East.2 He made an alliance with the king of Parthia, thus 

1 " Crassiis," said Pompey, " defeated the enemy in battle, but I cut up the war by 
its roots," 

2 Cicero advocated this measure in the familiar oration, Pro Lege Manilla. 



65 B.C.] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 247 

threatening Mithridates by an enemy in the rear. Then, 
forcing the Pontic monarch into a battle, he defeated him, 
and at last drove him beyond the Caucasus. Pompey, re- 
turning, reduced Syria, Phoenicia, and Palestine. 

The spirit of Mithridates was unbroken, in spite of the 
loss of his kingdom. He was meditating a march around 
the Euxine, and an invasion of Italy from the northeast, 
when, alarmed at the treachery of his son, he took poison, 
and died a victim of ingratitude. By his genius and courage 
he had maintained the struggle with the Romans for twenty- 
five years. 1 On reaching Rome, Pompey received a two-days' 
triumph. Before his chariot walked three hundred and 
twenty-four captive princes; and twenty thousand talents 
were deposited in the treasury as the spoils of conquest. 
Pompey was now at the height of his popularity, and might 
have usurped supreme power, but he lacked the energy and 
determination. 

Catiline's Conspiracy (63 b. c). — During Pompey's 
absence at the East, Catiline, an abandoned young noble- 
man, had formed a widespread plot to murder the consuls, 
fire the city, and overthrow the government. Cicero, the 
orator, exposed the conspiracy 5 ^ whereupon Catiline fled, 
and was soon after slain, fighting at the head of a band of 
desperadoes. 

The Chief Men of Rome now were Pompey, Crassus, 

1 The armor which fitted the gigantic frame of Mithridates excited the wonder 
alike of Asiatic and Italian. As a runner, he overtook tlie fleetest deer; as a rider, 
he broke the wildest steed; as a charioteer, he drove sixteen-in-hand ; and as a 
hunter, lie hit his game with his horse at full gallop. He kept Greek poets, historians, 
and philosophers at his court, and gave prizes not only to the greatest eater and 
drinker, but to the merriest jester and the best singer. He ruled the twenty-two 
nations of liis realm without tlie aid of an interpreter. He experimented on poisons, 
and souglit to harden his system to their effect. One day he disappeared from tlie 
palace and was absent for months. On his return, it appeared that he had wandered 
incognito through Asia Minor, studying the people and country. 

2 The orations which Cicero pronounced at this time against Catiline are master- 
pieces of impassioned rhetoric, and are still studied by every Latin scholar. 



248 



ROME. 



[60 B. C. 



Caesar,^ Cicero, and Cato 
the Stoic, — a great-grand- 
son of the Censor. The 
first three formed a league, 
known as the Triumvirate 
(60 B. c). To cement this 
union, Pompey married 
Juha, Cgesar's only daugh- 
ter. The triumvirs had 
everything their own way. 
Caesar was head manager ; 
he obtained the consul- 
ship, and afterward an 

CAIUS JULIUS CiESAR. ^' 

appointment as governor 
of Gaul ; Cicero was banished, and Cato sent to Cj^rus. 




1 CsBsar was born 100 b. c. (according to Mommsen, 102 B. c). A patrician, he was 
yet a friend of the people. His aunt was married to Marius; liis wife Cornelia was tlie 
daughter of Cinna. During Sulla's proscription, he refused to divorce his wife at the 
bidding of the dictator, and only the intercession of powerful friends saved his life. 
Sulla detected the character of this youth of eighteen years, and declared, "There is 
more than one Marius hid in him." While on his way to Rhodes to study oratory, he 
was taken prisoner by pirates, but he acted more like their leader than captive, and, on 
being ransomed, headed a party which crucified them all. Having been elected pontiff 
during his absence at the East, he returned to Rome. He now became in succession 
quaestor, sedile, and pontifex maximus. His affable manners and boundless generosity 
won all hearts. As aedile, a part of his duty was to furnish amusement to the people, 
and he exliibited three hundred and twenty pairs of gladiators, clad in silver armor. 
His debts became enormous, the heaviest creditor being the rich Crassus, to whom 
half the senators are said to have owed money. Securing an appointment as praetor, 
at the termination of that office, according to the custom, he obtained a province. 
Selecting Spain, he there recruited his wasted fortune, and gained some military 
prominence. He then came back to Rome, relinquishing a triumph in order to enter 
the city and stand for the consulship. This gained, liis next step was to secure a field 
where he could train an army, by whose help he might become master of Rome. 

It is a strange sight, indeed, to witness this spendthrift, pale and worn with the 
excesses of the capital, fighting at the head of his legions, swimming rivers, plunging 
through morasses, and climbing mountains,— the hardiest of the hardy, and the bravest 
of the brave. But it is stranger still to think of this great general and statesman as a 
literary man. Even when riding in his litter or resting, he was still reading or writ- 
ing, and often at the same time dictating to from four to seven amanuenses. Besides 
liis famous Commentaries, published in the very midst of his eventful career, he 
composed works on rhetoric and grammar, as well as tragedies, lyrics, etc. His style 
is pure and natural, and the polished smoothness of his sentences gives no hint of 
the stormy scenes amid which they were formed. 



58 B. c] 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 



249 



C^SAR remained in Gaul 
about nine years. He re- 
duced the entire country; 
crossed txie Rliiue, carrying 
the Roman arms into Ger- 
many for the first time; 
and twice invaded Britain, 
—an island until then un- 
known in Italy except by 
name. Not only were the 
three hundred tribes of 
Transalpine Gaul thorough- 
ly subdued, but they were 
made content with Csesar's 
rule. He became their civ- 
llizer,— building roads and 
introducing Roman laws, 
institutions, manners, and 
customs. Moreover, he 
trained an army that knew 
no mind or will except that 
of its great gen eral . Mean 
while, Caesars friends in 
Rome, with the Gallic spoils 
which he freely sent them, 
bribed and dazzled and in- 
trigued to sustain their 
master's power, and secure 
him the next consulship. 



Crassus was chosen 
joint consul with Pompey 
(56 B. c); he secured the 
province of Syria. Eager 
to obtain the boundless 
treasures of the East, he 
set out upon an expedition 
against Parthia. On the 
way he plundered the tem- 
ple at Jerusalem. While 
crossing tlie scorching 
plains beyond the Eu 
phiates, not far from Car- 
rhge (the Harran of the 
Bible), he was suddenly 
surrounded by clouds of 
Parthian horsemen. Ro- 
man valor was of no avail 
in that ceaseless storm of 
arrows. During the retreat. 
Crassus was slain. His 
head was carried to the 
Parthian king, who, in de- 
rision, ordered it to be filled 
with molten gold. The 
death of Crassus ended the 
Triumvirate. 



POMPEY, after a time, 
was elected joint consul 
with Crassus, aud,later,sole 
consul; he obtained the 
province of Spain, which he 
governed by legates. He 
now ruled Rome, and was 
bent on ruliug the empire. 
The death of his wife had 
severed the liuk which 
bound him to the conqueror 
of Gaul. He accordingly 
joined with the nobles, 
who were also alarmed by 
Caesar's brilliant victories, 
and the strength his suc- 
cessgave the popular party. 
A law was therefore passed 
ordering Caesar to resign 
his office and disband his 
armj^ before he appeared 
to sue for the consulship. 
The tribunes,— Antony and 
Cassius, — who supported 
Cajsar, were driven from 
the senate. They fled to 
Caesar's camp, and de- 
manded protection. 



Civil "War between Caesar and Pompey (49 b. c). — 

Caesar at once marched upon Rome. Pompey had boasted 
that he had only to stamp his foot, and an army would 
spring from the ground; but he now fled to Greece with- 
out striking a blow. In sixty days C^sar was master of 
Italy. The decisive struggle between the two rivals took 
place on the plain of PharsaUa (48 B. c). Pompey was 
beaten. He sought refuge in Egypt, where he was treach- 
erously slain. His head being brought to Caesar, the con- 
queror wept at the fate of his former friend. 

Caesar now placed the beautiful Cleopatra on the throne 
of the Ptolemies, and, marching into Syria, humbled 
Pharnaces, the son of Mithridates, so quickly that he 
could write home this laconic dispatch, Veni, Vidi, Vici 
(I came, I saw, I conquered). Cato and other Pompeian 



250 ROME. [46 b. C. 

leaders had assembled a great force in Africa, whereupon 
Caesar hurried his conquering" legions thither, and at Thap- 
sus broke down all opposition (46 B. c). Cato, in despair of 
the repubhc, fell upon his sword. 

Caesar now' returned to Rome to celebrate his 
triumphs. The sands of the arena were reddened with the 
blood of wild beasts and gladiators ; every citizen received 
a present, and a public banquet was spread on twenty-two 
thousand tables. The adulation of the senate surpassed all 
bounds. Csesar was created dictator for ten years and censor 
for three, and his statue was placed in the Capitol, opposite to 
that of Jupiter. Meantime the sons of Pompey had rallied 
an army in Spain, whither Cgesar hastened, and, in a desper- 
ate conflict at Munda (45 b. c), blotted their party out of ex- 
istence. He then returned to new honors and a campaign 
of civil reforms. 

Caesar's Government. — ^At Csesar's magic touch, order 
and justice sprang into new life. The provinces rejoiced in 
an honest administration. The G-auls obtained seats in the 
senate, and it was Csesar's design to have all the provinces 
represented in that body by their chief men. The calendar 
was revised.-"^ The distress among the poor was relieved by 
sending eighty thousand colonists to rebuild Corinth and 
Carthage. The number of claimants upon the public dis- 
tribution of grain was reduced over one haK. A plan was 
formed to dig a new channel for the Tiber and to drain 
the Pontine marshes. Nothing was too vast or too small 
for the comprehensive mind of this mighty statesman. He 
could guard the boundaries of his vast empire along the 
Rhine, Danube, and Euphrates ; look after the paving of the 

1 The Roman j^ear contained only three hundred and fifty-five days, and the mid- 
summer and the mid-winter months then came in the spring and the fall. Julius 
Caesar introduced the extra day of leap year, and July was named after him (see 
Steele's New Astronomy, p. 269). 



44 B. c] 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 



251 



Roman streets j and listen to the recitation of pieces for 
prizes at the theaters, bestowing the wreath upon the victor 
with extempore vei'se. 

Caesar's Assassination (44 b. c). — Caesar, now dictator 
for Ufe, was desirous of being king in name, as in fact. 
While passing through the streets one day, he was hailed 
king J as the crowd murmured, he cried out, '^ I am not king, 
but Caesar." Still, when Mark Antony, the consul and his 
intimate friend, at a festival, offered him a crown, Caesar 
seemed to thrust it aside reluctantly. The ire of zealous 
republicans was excited, and, under the guise of a love of 
hberty and old Roman virtue, those who were jealous of 
Caesar or who hated him formed a conspiracy for his assassi- 
nation. Brutus and Cassius, the leaders, chose the fifteenth 
of the ensuing March for the execution of the deed. As the 
day approached, the air was thick with rumors of approach- 
ing disaster. A famous augur warned Caesar to beware of 
the Ides^ of March. The night before, his wife, Calpurnia, was 
disturbed by an ominous 
dream. On the way to the 
senate-house he was handed 
a scroll containing the de- 
tails of the plot, but in 
the press he had no chance 
to read it. When the con- 
spirators crowded about 
him, no alarm was caused, 
as they were men who owed 
their lives to his leniency, and their fortunes to his favor. 

1 In the Roman calendar the months were divided into three 'parts,— Calends, Ides, 
and. Nones. Tlie Calends commenced on the first of each month, and were reckoned 
backward into the i)receding month to the Ides. The Nones fell on the seventh of 
March, May, July, and Octoher, and on the fifth of the other months. The Ides came 
on the thirteenth of all months except these four, when they Avere the fifteenth. 

2 S. P. Q. R.,— Senatus Populusque Romanus (the Senate and Roman People). 




THE ROMAN EMBLEM. 2 



252 ROME. [44 B. a 

Suddenly swords gleamed on every hand. For a moment 
the great soldier defended himself with the sharp point of 
his iron pen. Then, catching sight of the loved and trusted 
Brutus, he exclaimed, " Et tu. Brute ! " (And thou, too, 
Brutus!) and, wrapping his mantle about his face, sank 
dead at the foot of Pompey's statue.^ 

The Result was very different from what the assassins had 
expected. The senate rushed out horror-stricken at the deed. 
The reading of Caesar's will, in which he gave every citizen 
three hundred sesterces (over ten dollars), and threw open 
liis splendid gardens across the Tiber as a pubhc park, roused 
the popular fmy. When Antony pronounced the funeral 
eulogy, and finally held up Ceesar's rent and bloody toga, 
the mob broke through every restraint, and ran with torches 
to burn the houses of the murderers. Brutus and Cassius 
fled to save theii* lives. 

Second Triumvirate (43 b. c). — Antony was fast get- 
ting power into his hand, when there arrived at Rome 
Octavius, Caesar's great-nephew and heir. He received 
the support of the senate and of Cicero, who denounced 
Antony in fiery orations. Antony was forced into exile, 
and then, twice defeated in battle, took refuge with 

1 Caesar's brief public life— for only five stirring years elapsed from his entrance 
into Italy to his assassination— was full of dramatic scenes. Before marcliing upon 
Kome, it is said (though researcli stamps it as doubtful) that Jie stopped at the Rubicon, 
the boundary between his province of Cisalpine Gaul and Italy, and hesitated long. 
To pass it was to make war upon the republic. At last he shouted, " The die is 
cast!" and plunged into the stream.— When he had crossed into Greece in pursuit of 
Pompey, he became impatient at Antony's delay in bringing over the rest of the 
army, and, disguising himself, attempted to return across the Adriatic in a small boat. 
The sea ran high, and the crew determined to put back, when Caesar shouted, " Go on 
boldly, fear nothing, thou bearest Cfesar and his fortune ! "—At the battle of Phar- 
salia, he ordered his men to aim at the faces of Pompey's cavalry. The Roman 
knights, dismayed at this attack on their beauty, quickly fled ; after the victory 
Cfesar rode over the field, calling upon the men to spare the Roman citizens, and on 
reaching Pompey's tent put lus letters in tlie fire unread.— When Ciesar learned of the 
death of Cato, he lamented the tragic fate of such high integrity and virtue, and ex- 
claimed, "Cato, I envy thee thy death, since thou enviest me the glory of saving thy 
lifel" 



43 b. c] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 253 

Lepidus, governor of a part of Spain and Gaul. Oetavins 
returned to Rome, won the favor of the people, and, though 
a youth of only nineteen, was chosen consul. A triumvi- 
rate, similar to tlie one seventeen years before, was now 
formed betw(3en Antony, Octavius, and Lepidus. The bar- 
gain was sealed by a proscription more horrible than that of 
Sulla. Lepidus sacrificed his brother, Antony his uncle, 
and Octavius his warm supporter, Cicero. The oratoi^s 
head having been brought to Rome, Fulvia thrust her golden 
bodkin through the tongue that had pronounced the Philip- 
pics against her husband Antony. 

Battle of Philippi (42 b. c). — Brutus and Cassius, who 
had gone to the East, raised an army to resist this new 
coaKtion. The triumvirs pursued them, and the issue was 
decided on the field of FMlippi. Brutus^ and Cassius 
were defeated, and in despair committed suicide. Octavius 
and Antony divided the empire between them, the former 
taking the West, and the latter the East. Lepidus received 
Africa, but was soon stripped of his share and sent back to 
Rome. 

Antony and Cleopatra. — Antony now went to Tarsus 
to look after his new possessions. Here Cleopatra was 
summoned to answer for having supported Cassius against 
the triumvirs. She came, captivated Antony by her charms,^ 



1 Brutus, befora this battle, was disheartened. The triumvirs had proved worse 
tyrants than he could ever have feared Cajsar would become. He and Cassius quar- 
reled bitterly. His wife, Portia, had died (according to some authorities) broken- 
hearted at the calamities which had befallen her country. One night, as he was 
sitting alone in his tent, musing over the troubled state of affairs, he suddenly 
perceived a gigantic figure standiug before him. He was startled, but exclaimed; 
" What art thou, and for what purpose art thou come'? "— " I am thine evil genius," 
replied the phantom ; " we shall meet again at Philippi ! " 

2 Cleopatra ascended the Cydnus in a galley with purple sails. The oars, inlaid 
with silver, moved to the soft music of flute and pipe. She reclined under a gold- 
spangled canopy, attired as Venus, and attended by nymphs, cupids, and graces. 
The air was redolent with perfumes. As she approached Tarsus, the whole city 
flocked to witness the magnificent sight, leaving Antony sitting alone in the tribunaL 



254 ROME.' [41 B.C. 

and carried him to Egypt, They passed the winter in the 
wildest extravagance. Breaking away for a time from the 
silken chains of Cleopatra, Antony, upon the death of Fulvia, 
married the beautiful and noble Octavia, sister of Octavius. 
But at the first opportunity he went back again to Alexan- 
dria, where he laid aside the dignity of a Roman citizen and 
assumed the dress of an Egyptian monarch.^ Cleopatra 
was presented with several provinces, and became the real 
ruler of the East. 

Civil War between Octavius and Antony (31 b. c). 
— The senate at last declared war against Cleopatra. There- 
upon Antony divorced Octavia and prepared to invade Italy. 
The rival fleets met off the promontory of Ac'tium. Cleo- 
patra fled with her ships early in the day. Antony, basely 
deserting those who were dying for his cause, followed her. 
Wlien Octavius entered Egypt (30 B. c), there was no resist- 
ance. Antony, in despair, stabbed himself. Cleopatra in 
vain tried her arts of fascination upon the conqueror. 
Finally, to avoid gracing his triumph at Rome, she put an 
end to her life, according to the common story, by the bite 
of an asp, brought her in a basket of figs. Thus died the 
last of the Ptolemies. 

Result. — Egypt now became a province of Rome. "With 
the battle of Actium ended the Roman republic. Caesar 
Octavius was the undisputed master of the civilized world. 
After his return to Italy, he received the title of Augustus, 
by which name he is known in history. The civil wars 
were over. 

1 The follies and wasteful extravagance of their mad revels at Alexandria almost 
surpass Ijelief. One day, iu Antony's kitchen, there are said to have been eight wild 
boars roasting whole, so arranged as to be ready at different times, that his dinner 
might be served in perfection whenever he should see fit to order it On another 
occasion be and the queen vied as to which could servo the more expensive banquet. 
Removing a magnificent pearl from her ear, she dissolved it in vinegar, and swal 
lowed the priceless draught. 



31B.C.3 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY* 



IMPERIAL ROME. 

Establishment of the Empire. — ^After the clamor of 
a hundred years, a sweet silence seemed to fall upon the 
earth. The Temple of Janus was closed for the second time 




J.WELLS, DEL, 



RUSSELL & STRUJMERS,-E«.GiSj'!!(i,1&~ 



since the pious Numa. Warned by the fate of Julius, 
Augustus did not take the name of king, nor startle the 
Boman prejudices by any sudden seizure of authority. He 



256 ROME. [31B.0. 

kept up all the forms of the republic. Every ten years he 
went through the farce of laying down his rank as chief of 
the army, or imperator, — a word since contracted to emperor. 
He professed himself the humble servant of the senate, 
while he really exercised absolute power. Gradually all the 
offices of trust were centered in him. He became at once 
proconsul, consul, censor, tribune, and high priest.^ 

Massacre of Varus (9 a. d.). — Germany, under the 
vigorous rule of Drusus and Tiberius, step-sons of Augustus, 
now seemed hl^ely to become as thoroughly Romanized 
as Gaul had been (Brief Hist. France, p. 11). Varus, gov- 
ernor of the proviace, thinking the conquest complete, at- 
tempted to iatroduce the Latin language and laws. There- 
upon Armioius, a noble, freedom-loving German, aroused 
his countrymen, and in the wilds of the Teutoburg Forest 
took a terrible revenge for the wrongs they had suffered. 
Yarns and his entire army perished.^ Dire was the dismay 
at Rome when news came of this disaster. For days 
Augustus wandered through his palace, beatiag his head 
against the waU, and crying, "Varus, give me back my 
legions ! " Six years later the whitened bones of these hap- 
less warriors were buried by Germanicus, the gifted son of 
Drusus, who in vain endeavored to restore the Roman au- 
thority in Germany. 

The Augustan Age (31 b. C.-14 a. d.) was, however, one 
of general peace and prosperity. The emperor hved unos- 

1 As consul, he became chief magistrate ; as censor, he could decide who were to 
be senators; as tribune, he heard appeals, and liis person was sacred; as imperator, 
he commanded the army ; and as ponttfex maximus, or chief priest, he was the head 
of the national religion. These were powers originally belonging to the king, but 
which, during the republic, from a fear of centralization, had been distributed among 
different persons. Now the emperor gathered them up again. 

2 Creasy reckons this among the fifteen decisive battles of the world. "Had Ar- 
minius been defeated," says Arnold, " our German ancestors would have been en- 
slaved or exterminated, and the great English nation would have been struck out of 
existence." 



14A.D.] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 257 

tentatiously in his house, not in a palace, and his toga was 
woven by his wife Livia and her maidens. He revived the 
worship of the gods. His chosen friends were men of 
letters. He beautified Rome, so that he could truly boast 
that he "found the city of brick, and left it of marble." 
There was now no fear of pirates or hostUe fleets, and grain 
came in plenty from Egypt. The people were amused and 
fed ; hence they were contented. The provinces were well 
governed,^ and many gained Roman citizenship. A single 
language became a universal bond of intercourse, and Rome 
began her work of civilization and education. Wars having 
so nearly ceased, and interest in politics having diminished, 
men turned their thoughts more toward literature, art, and 
religion. 

The Birth of Christ, the central figure in all history, 
occurred during the widespread peace of this reign. 

The Empire was^ in general, bounded by the Euphrates 
on the east, the Danube and the Rhine on the north, the 
Atlantic Ocean on the west, and the deserts of Africa on the 
south. It comprised about a hundred millions of people, of 
perhaps a hundred different nations, each speaking its own 
language and worshiping its own gods. An army of three 
hundred and fifty thousand men held the provinces in check, 
while the Praetorian Guard of ten thousand protected the 
person of the emperor. The Mediterranean, which the 
Romans proudly called " our own sea," served as a natural 
highway between the widely sundered parts of this vast 
region, while the Roman roads, straight as an eagle's flight, 
bound every portion of the empire to its center. Every- 
where the emperor's will was law. His smile or frown was 

1 One day when Augustus was sailing in the Bay of Baiae, a Greek ship was pass- 
ing. The sailors, perceiving the emperor, stopped their vessel, arrayed themselves in 
white robes, and, going on board his yacht, offered sacrifice to him as a god, saying, 
" You have given to us happiness. You have secured to us our lives and our goods." 



258 



ROME. 



[1st cent. a. d. 



the fortune or ruin of a man, a city, or a province. His 
character determined the prosperity of the empire. 

He hved to be seventy-six years old, having reigned forty- 
four years. At his death ^ the senate decreed that divine 
honors should be given him, and temples were erected for 
his worship. From him the month August was named. 

Henceforth the history of Rome is not that of the people, 
but of its emperors. Of these, forty-two were murdered, 
three committed suicide, and two were forced to abdicate 
the throne.^ None of the early emperors was followed by 
his own son, but, according to the Roman law of adoption, 
they all counted as Caesars. Nero was the last of them at 
all connected with Augustus, even by adoption, though the 
emperors called themselves C^sar and Augustus to the last. 
After the death of Augustus, 




COIN OF TIBERIUS C^SAB. 



Tiberius (14 a. d.), his step-son, secured the empire by 
a decree of the senate. The army on the Rhine would have 



1 The domestic life of Augustus was not altogether happy. He suffered greatly 
from the imperious disposition of Livia,— his fourth wife,— whom, however, he loved 
too dearly to coerce ; from his step-son Tibei'ius, whose turbulence he was forced to 
check by sending him in exile to Rhodes ; and still more keenly from the immoral 
conduct of his daughter Julia,, whom, with her mother, Scribonia, he was also com- 
pelled to banish. 

2 In the following pages a brief account is given of the principal monarchs only; 
a full list of the emperors may be found on p. 311. 



14 A. D.] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 259 

gladly given the throne to the noble Germanicus, but 
he declined the honor. Jealous of this kinsman, Tiberius, 
it is thought, afterward removed him by poison. The 
new emperor ruled for a time with much ability, yet soon 
proved to be a gloomy tyi-ant,^ and finally retired to the 
Island of Capreae, to practice in secret his infamous orgies. 
His favorite, the cruel and ambitious Seja^nus, prefect of 
the Praetorian Guard, remained at Rome as the real ruler, 
but, having conspired against his master, he was thrown 
into the Mamertine Prison, and there strangled. Many of 
the best citizens fell victims to the emperor's suspicious 
disposition, and all, even the surviving members of his own 
family, breathed easier when news came of his sudden 
death. 

The great event of this reign was the crucifixion of Christ ^ 
at Jerusalem, under Pilate, Roman procurator of Judea. 

Caligula^ (37 a. d.) inherited some of his father's virtues, 
but he was weak-minded, and his history records only a 
madman's freaks. He made his favorite horse a consul, and 
provided him a golden manger. Any one at whom the 
emperor nodded his head or pointed his finger was at once 
executed. ^' Would," said he, "that all the people at Rome 
had but one neck, so I could cut it off at a single blow." 

Nero (54 a. d.) assassinated his mother and wife. In the 
midst of a great fire which destroyed a large part of Rome, 
he chanted a poem to the music of his lyre, while he 
watched the flames. To secure himself against the charge 
of having at least spread the fire, he ascribed the confla- 

1 His character resembled that of Louis XI. (see Brief Hist. France, p. 94). 

2 Over his cross was an Inscription in three languages, significant of the three 
best developments then known of the human race,— Roman law, Greek mind, and 
Hebrew faith. 

3 Calus, son of Germanicus, and great-grandson of Augustus, received from the 
soldiers the nickname of Caligula, by which he is always known, because he wore 
little boots (caligulce) while with his father in camp on the Rhine. 



260 



ROME. 



[1st cent. a. d. 



gration to the Christians. These were cruelly persecuted,^ 
St. Paul and St. Peter, according to tradition, being mar- 
tyred at this time. In rebuilding the city, Nero substi- 
tuted broad streets for the winding lanes in the hollow 
between the Seven Hills, and, in place of the unsightly 
piles of brick and wood, erected handsome stone buildings, 
each block surrounded by a colonnade. 




COIN OF NERO. 



Vespasian (69 a. d.) was made emperor by his army in 
Judea. An old-fashioned Roman, he sought to revive the 
ancient virtues of honesty and frugality. His son Titus, 
after capturing Jerusalem (pp. 85, 284), shared the throne 
with his father, and finally succeeded to the empire. His 
generosity and kindness won him the name of the Delight 
of Mankind. He refused to sign a death-warrant, and pro- 
nounced any day lost in which he had not done some one 
a favor. During this happy period, Agricola conquered 
nearly all Britain, making it a Roman province; the 
famous Colosseum at Rome was finished ; but Pompeii and 



1 Some were crucified. Some were covered with the skins of wild beasts, and 
worried to death by dogs. Some were thrown to the tigers and lions in the Amphi- 
theater. Gray-haired men were forced to fight with trained gladiators. Worst of all, 
one night Nero's gardens were lighted by Christians, who, their clothes having been 
smeared with pitch and ignited, were placed as blazing torches along the course on 
which the emperor, heedless of their agony, drove his chariot in the races. 



79 a. D.] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 261 

Herculaneum were destroyed by an eruption of Mount 
Vesuvius.^ 

Domitian^ (81 a. d.) was a second Nero or Caligula. His 
chief amusement was in spearing flies with a pinj yet he 
styled himself " Lord and God/' and received divine honors. 
He banished the philosophers, and renew^ed the persecution 
of the Christians. At this time St. John was exiled to the 
Isle of Patmos. 

The Five Good Emperors (96-180 a. d.) now brought 
in the palmiest days of Rome. Nerva, a quiet, honest old 
man, distributed lands among the plebs, and taught them to 
work for a living. Trajan^ a great Spanish general, con- 
quered the Dacians and many Eastern peoples; founded 
public Ubraries and schools in Italy; and tried to restore 
freedom of speech and simphcity of life.^ Hadrian traveled 
almost incessantly over his vast empire, overseeing the gov- 
ernment of the provinces, and erecting splendid buildings. 
Antoninus Pius was a second Numa ; by his love of justice 
and religion, he diffused the blessings of peace and order over 
the civilized world. Marcus Aurelms^ was a philosopher, 
and loved quiet. But the time of peace had passed. The 
Germans, pressed by Russian Slavs, fled before them, and 
crossed the Roman frontiers as in the time of Marius. The 
emperor was forced to take the field in person, and died 
during the eighth winter campaign. 

Decline of the Empire. — The most virtuous of men 
was succeeded by a weak, vicious boy, his son Commodus. 



1 The forgotten site of Pompeii was accidentally discovered in 1748 (see p 300) 

2 Domitian is said to have once called together the senate to decide how a fish 
should he cooked for his dinner. 

3 Two centuries afterward, at the accession of each emperor, the senate wished 
that he might he " more fortunate than Augustus, more virtuous tlian Trajau " 

4 Marcus Aurelius took the name of his adoptive father, Antoninus so that this 
period is known as the Age of the Antonines. 



262 ROME. [180 A. D. 

An era of military despotism followed. Murder became 
domesticated in the palace of the Caesars. The Praetorian 
Guards put up the imperial power at auction, and sold it to 
the highest bidder. The armies in the provinces declared 
for their favorite officers, and the throne became the stake 
of battle. Few of the long list of emperors who succeeded 
to the throne are worthy of mention. 

Septimlus Seve'rus (193 a. d.), a general in Germany, 
after defeating his rivals, ruled vigorously, though often 
cruelly. His triumphs in Parthia and Britain renewed the 
glory of the Roman arms. 

Car'acarius (211 a. d.) would be remembered only for 
his ferocity, but that he gave the right of Roman citizenship 
to all the provinces, in order to tax them for the benefit of 
his soldiers. This event marked an era in the history of 
the empire, and greatly lessened the importance of Rome. 

Alexander Seve^rus (222 a. d.) delighted in the society 
of the wise and good. He favored the Christians, and over 
the door of his palace were inscribed the words, " Do unto 
others that which you would they should do unto you." He 
won victories against the Germans and Persians (Sassanidae, 
p. 156), but, attempting to establish disciphne in the army, 
was slain by his mutinous troops in the bloom of youth. 

The Barbarian Goths, Germans, and Persians, who 
had so long threatened the empire, invaded it on every side. 
The emperor Decius was killed in battle by the Goths. 
Gallus bought peace by an annual tribute. Valerian was 
taken prisoner by the Persian king, who carried him about 
in chains, and used him as a footstool in mounting his horse. 
The temple at Ephesus was burned at this time by the Goths. 

Dm'ing the general confusion, so many usm-pers sprang 
up over the empire and established short-lived kingdoms, 
that this is known as the Era of the Thirty Tyrants. 



268 a. D.] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 263 

The lUyrian Emperors (268-284 a. d.), however, rolled 
back the tide of invasion. Claudius vanquished the Goths 
in a contest which recalled the days of Marius and the Gauls. 
Aiirelian drove the Germans into their native wilds, and de- 
feated Zenobia, the beautiful and heroic queen of Palmyra, 
bringing her to Rome in chains of gold to grace his triumph. 
Frobus triumphed at the East and the West, and, turning to 
the arts of peace, introduced the vine into Germany, and 
taught the legions to work in vineyard and field. Diode' tian 
began a new method of government. To meet the swarm- 
ing enemies of the empire, he associated with himself his 
comrade-in-arms, Maximian;, each emperor took the title of 
Augustus, and appointed, under the name of Caesar, a brave 
general as his successor. War raged at once in Persia, 
Egypt, Britain, and Germany, but the four rulers vigilantly 
watched over their respective provinces, and the Roman 
eagles conquered every foe. 

In the year 303 a. d. the joint emperors celebrated the 
last triumph ever held at Rome. During the same year, also, 
began the last and most bitter persecution of the Christians,^ 
so that this reign is called the Era of the Martyrs. 

Spread of Christianity. — The rehgion founded by 
Jesus of Nazareth, and preached during the 1st century by 
Paul and the other Apostles (see Acts of the Apostles), had 
now spread over the Western Empire. It was largely, how- 
ever, confined to the cities, as is curiously shown in the fact 
that the word ^' pagan" originally meant only a countryman. 
Though the Romans tolerated the religious belief of every 
nation which they conquered, they cruelly persecuted Chris- 
tians. This was becauso the latter opposed the national 

1 In 305 A. D. both emperors resigned the purple. Diocletian amused himself by 
working in his garden, and when Maximian sought to draw him out of his retire 
ment he wrote: "If you could see the cabbages I have planted with my own hand, 
you would never ask me to remount the throne." 



264 ROME. [4th CENT. A. D. 

religion of the empire, and refused to offer sacrifice to its 
gods, and to worship its emperors. Moreover, the Christians 
absented themselves from the games and feasts, and were 
accustomed to hold their meetings at night, and often in 
secret. They were therefore looked upon as enemies of the 
state, and were persecuted by even the best rulers, as Trajan 
and Diocletian. This opposition, however, served only to 
strengthen the rising faith. The heroism of the martyrs 
extorted the admiration of their enemies. Thus, when Poly- 
carp was hurried before the tribunal and urged to curse 
Christ, he exclaimed, " Eighty-six years have I served Him, 
and He has done me nothing but good ; how could I curse 
Him, my Lord and Saviom* ? " And when the flames rose 
around him he thanked God that he was deemed worthy of 
such a death. With the decaying empire. Heathenism grew 
weaker, while Christianity gained strength. As early as the 
reign of Septimius Severus, Tertullian declared that if the 
Christians were forced to emigrate, the empire would become 
a desert. 

Loss of Roman Prestige. — Men no longer looked to 
Rome for their citizenship. The army consisted principally 
of Gauls, Germans, and Britons, who were now as good Ro- 
mans as any. The emperors were of provincial birth. The 
wars kept them on the frontiers, and Diocletian, it is said, 
had never seen Rome until he came there in the twentieth 
year of his reign to celebrate his triumph. His gorgeous 
Asiatic court, with its pompous ceremonies and its king 
wearing the hated crown, was so ridiculed in Rome by 
song and lampoon that the monarch never returned. His 
headquarters were kept at Nicomedia (Bithynia) in Asia 
Minor, and Maximian's at MUan. 

Constantine, the Caesar in Britain, having been pro- 
claimed Augustus by his troops, overthrew five rivals who 



324 A. D.] THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 265 

contested the throne, and became sole ruler (324 a. d.). His 
reign marked an era in the world's history. It was char- 
acterized by three changes: 1. Christianity became, in a 
sense, the state rehgion.^ 2. The capital was removed to 
Byzantium, a Greek city, afterward known as Constantinople 
(Constantine's city). 3. The monarchy was made an abso- 
lute despotism, the power of the army weakened, and a court 
estabhshed, whose nobles, receiving their honors directly 
from the emperor, took rank with, if not the place of, the 
former consul, senator, or patrician. 

The First General ((Ecumenical) Council of the 
Church was held at Nicaea (325 a. d.), to consider the teach- 
ings otArius, a priest of Alexandria, who denied the divinity 
of Christ. Arianism was denounced, and the opposing 
doctrines of another Alexandrian priest, Athana'sius, were 
adopted as the Nicene Creed. 

Christianity soon conquered the empire. The emperor 
Julian, the Apostate, an excellent man though a Pagan 
philosopher, sought to restore the old religion, but in vain. 
The best intellects, repelled from political discussion by the 
tyranny of the government, turned to the consideration of 
theological questions. This was especially true of the East- 
ern Church, where the Greek mind, so fond of metaphysical 
subtleties, was predominant. 

Barbarian Invasions. — In the latter part of the 4th 
century, a host of savage Huns,^ bursting mto Europe, drove 

1 According to the legend, when Gonstantine was marching against Maxentius, 
the rival Augustus at Rome, he saw ir the 8k> at mid-day a flaming cross, and beneath 
it the words, " IN THIS conqueii ! " Constantino accepted the new faith, and assumed 
the standard of the cross, which was henceforth borne by the Christian emperors. 

2 The Huns were a Turanian race from Asia. They were short, thick-set, with 
flat noses, deep-sunk es'es, and a yellow complexion. Their faces were hideously 
scarred with slashes to prevent the growth of the beard. An historian of the time com- 
pares their ugliness to the grinning heads carved on the i)osts of bridges. They 
dressed in skins, which were worn until they rotted off, and lived on horseback, 
carrying their families and all their possessions in huge wagons. 



266 ROME. [378 A. D. 

the Teutons in terror before them. The frightened Goths ^ 
obtained permission to cross the Danube for an asylum, and 
soon a million of these wild warriors stood, sword in hand, 
on the Roman territory. They were assigned lands in 
Thrace ; but the ill treatment of the Roman officials drove 
them to arms. They defeated the emperor Valens in a 
terrible battle near Adrianople, the monarch himself being 
burned to death in a peasant's cottage, where he had been 
carried wounded. The victorious Goths pressed forward to 
the very gates of Constantinople. 

Theodosius the Great, a Spaniard, i-aised from a farm 
to the throne, stayed for a few years the inevitable prog- 
ress of events. He pacified the Goths, and enlisted forty 
thousand of their warriors under the eagles of Rome. He 
forbade the worship of the old gods, and tried to put down 
the Arian heresy, so prevalent at Constantinople. At his 
death (395 a. d.) the empire was divided between his two 
sons. 

Henceforth the histories of the Eastern or Byzantine and 
the Western Empire are separate. The former is to go on 
at Constantinople for one thousand years, while Rome ii^ 
soon to pass into the hands of the barbarians. 

The 5th Century is known as the Um of the Great 
Migrations. During this period, Europe was turbulent with 
the movements of the restless Germans. Pressed by the 
Huns, the different tribes — the East and West Goths, Franks, 
Alans, Vandals, Burgundians, Longobards (Lombards), Alle- 
manns, Angles, Saxons — ^poured south and west with irre- 

1 The Goths were already somewhat advanced in civilization through their inter- 
course with the Romans, and we read of Gothic leaders who were "judges of Homer, 
and carried well-cliosen books with them on their travels." Under the teachings of 
their good bishop, Ul'philas, many accepted Christianity, and the Bible was translated 
into their language They, however, became Arians. and so a new element of discord 
was introduced, as they hated the Catholic Christians of Home (see Brief Hist. 
France, p. 14). 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 267 

sistible fury, arms in hand, seeking new homes in the 
crumbling Roman Empire. It was nearly two centuries 
before the turmoil subsided enough to note the changes 
which had taken place. 

Three Great Barbaric Leaders, Al'aric the Goth, 
At'tila the Hun, and G-en'seric the Vandal, were conspicuous 
in the grand catastrophe. 

1. Alaric having been chosen prince of the Goths, after 
the death of Theodosius, passed the defile of Thermopylge, 
and devastated Greece, destroying the precious monuments 
of its former glory. Sparta and Athens, once so brave, made 
no defense. He was finally driven back by StUicho, a Van- 
dal, but the only great Roman general. Alaric next moved 
upon Italy, but was repeatedly repulsed by the watchful 
Stilicho. The Roman emperor Honorius, jealous of his 
successful general, ordered his execution. When Alaric 
came again, there was no one to oppose his progress. All 
the barbarian Germans, of every name, joined his victorious 
arms. Rome ^ bought a brief respite with a ransom of ^' gold, 
silver, silk, scarlet cloth, and pepper ; " but The Eternal City, 
which had not seen an enemy before its walls since the 
day when it defied Hannibal, soon fell without a blow (410 
A. D.). No Horatius was there to hold the bridge in this 
hour of peril. The gates were thrown open, and at midnight 
the Gothic trumpet awoke the inhabitants. For six days 
the barbarians held high revel, and then their clumsy 



1 " Rome, at tliis time, contained probably a million of inhabitants, and its wealth 
might well attract the cupidity of the barbarous invader. The palaces of the senators 
were filled with gold and silver ornaments,— the prize of many a bloody campaign. 
The churches were rich with the contributions of pious worshipers. On the en- 
trance of the Goths, a fearful scene of pillage ensued. Houses were fired to light the 
streets. Great numbers of citizens were driven off to be sold as slaves ; while others 
fled to Africa, or the islands of the Mediterranean. Alaric, being an Arian, tried to 
save the churches, as well as the city, from destruction. But now began that swift 
decay which soon reduced Rome to heaps of ruins, and rendered the title ' The 
Eternal City' a sad mockery."— *Smi(ft.. 



268 



ROME. 



wagons, heaped high with priceless plunder, moved south 
along the Appian Way. Alaric died soon after. ^ His suc- 
cessor, Adolphus, triumphantly married the sister of the 
emperor,^ and was styled an officer of Rome. Under his 
guidance, the Goths and Germans tui'ned westward into 
Spain and southern Gaul. There they founded a powerful 
Visigothic kingdom, with Toulouse as its capital. 

2. Attila, King of the 
hideous Huns, gathering 
half a million savages, set 
forth westward from his 
wooden palace in Hungary, 
vowing not to stop till he 
reached the sea. He called 
himself the Scourge of 
God, and boasted that 
where his horse set foot 
grass never grew again 
On the field of Chalons 
(451 A. D.), ^aius, the Ro- 
man general in Gaul, and 
Theodoric, King of the 
Goths, arrested this Tu- 
ranian horde, and saved 
^^^j^^^ Europe to Christianity and 

Aryan civilization. Burn- 
ing with revenge, Attila crossed the Alps and descended 




1 The Goths, in order to hide his tomb, turned aside a stream, and, digging a 
grave in its bed, placed therein the body, clad in richest armor. They then let the 
water back, and slew the prisoners who had done the work. 

2 During this disgraceful campaign, Honorius lay hidden in the inaccessible 
morasses of Ravenna, where he amused himself with his pet chickens. When some 
one told him Rome was lost, he replied, "That cannot be, for I fed her out of my 
hand a moment ago," alluding to a hen which he called Rome. 



THE POLITICAL HISTORY. 269 

into Italy. City after city was spoiled and burned.^ Just 
as he was about to march upon Rome, Pope Leo came forth 
to meet him, and the barbarian, awed by his majestic mien 
and the glory which yet clung to that seat of empire, 
agreed to spare the city. Attila returned to the banks 
of the Danube, where he died shortly after, leaving behind 
him in history no mark save the ruin he had wrought. 

3. GenseriCj leading across into Africa the Vandals, who 
had already settled the province of Vandalvi^m. in southern 
Spain, founded an empire at Carthage. Wishing to revive 
its former maritime greatness, he built a fleet and gained 
control of the Mediterranean. His ships cast anchor in the 
Tiber, and the intercessions of Leo were now fruitless to 
save Rome. For fourteen days the pirates plundered the 
city of the Caesars. Works of art, bronzes, precious marbles, 
were ruthlessly destroyed, so that the word " vandalism " be- 
came synonymous with wanton devastation. 

Fall of the Roman Empire (476 a. d.). — The com- 
mander of the barbarian troops in the pay of Rome now set 
up at pleasure one puppet emperor after another. The last 
of these phantom monarchs, Romulus Augustulus,^ by a sin- 
gular coincidence bore the names of the founder of the city 
and of the empire. Finally, at the command of Odo'acer, 
German chief of the mercenaries, he laid down his useless 
scepter. The senate sent the tiara and purple robe to 
Constantinople ; and Zeno, the Eastern emperor, appointed 
Odoacer Patrician of Italy. So the Western Empire passed 
away, and only this once proud title remained to recall its 
former glory. Byzantium had displaced Rome. 



1 The inhabitants of Aquileia and other cities, seeking a refuge In the islands 
of the Adriatic, founded Venice, fitly named The Eldest Daughter of the Empire. 

2 Augustulus is the diminutive for Augustus. 



270 



ROME. 

2. THE CIVILIZATION. 



Society. — The early Eoman social and political organization 
was similar to the Athenian (p. 158). The true Roman people 
comprised only the patricians and their clients. The patricians 
formed the ruling class, and, even in the time of the republic, gave 
to Roman history an aristocratic character. Several clients were 
attached to each patrician, serving his interests, and, in turn, being 
protected by him. 




ROMAN CONSUL AND LICTOUS. 



The three original tribes of patricians (Ramnes, Titles, and 
Luceres) were each divided into ten curice, and each curia theoreti- 
cally into ten gentes (houses or clans). The members of a Roman 
curia, or ward, like those of an Athenian pTiratry, possessed many 
interests in common, each curia having its own priest and lands. A 
gens comprised several families,i united usually by kinship and 



1 Contrary to the custom in Greece, where family names were seldom used, and a 
man was generally known hy a single name having reference to some personal pecu- 
liarity or circumstance (p. 175), to every Roman three names were given : the prceno- 
men or individual name, the nomen or clan name, and the cognomen or family name. 
Sometimes a fourth name was added to commemorate some exploit. Thus, in the 
case of Puhlius Cornelius Scipio Africanus, and his brother Lucius Cornelius Scipio 
Asiaticus (note, p. 235), we recognize all these titles. 



THE CIVILIZATION. 271 

intermarriage, and bearing the same name. Within the gens, 
each family formed its own little community, governed by the 
"paterfamilias," who owned all the property. The sons dwelt 
under the paternal roof, often long after they were married, and 
cultivated the family estate in common. 

Magistrates. — The Consuls commanded the army, and executed 
the decrees of the senate and the people. They were chosen an- 
nually. They wore a white robe witi a purple border, and were 
attended by twelve lictors bearing the ax and rods {fasces, p. 208), 
emblems of the consular power. At the approach of a consul, all 
heads were uncovered, seated persons arose, and those on horse- 
back dismounted. No one was eligible to the consulship until he 
was forty-three years of age, and had held the offices of qusestor, 
sedile, and praetor. 

The QucBstors received and paid out the moneys of the state. 

The ^diles, two (and afterward four) in number, took charge of 
the public buildings, the cleaning and draining of the streets, and 
the superintendence of the police and the public games. 

The Prcetor was a sort of judge. At first there was only one, 
but finally, owing to the increase of Roman territory, there were 
sixteen, of these officers. In the later days of the republic it 
became customary for the consuls and the praetors, after serving 
a year in the city, to take command of provinces, and to assume 
the title of proconsul or propraetor. 

The Tivo Censors were elected for five years. They took the cen- 
sus of the names and property of Roman citizens; arranged the 
different classes (p. 212); corrected the lists of senators and 
equites, striking out the unworthy, and filling vacancies; pun- 
ished extravagance and immorality; levied the taxes; and re- 
paired and constructed public works, roads, etc. 

The Army. — Every citizen between the ages of seventeen and 
fifty was subject to military service, unless he was of the lowest 
class, or had served twenty campaigns in the infantry or ten in 
the cavalry. The drill was severe, and included running, jump- 
ing, swimming in full armor, and marching long distances at the 
rate of four miles per hour. There were four classes of foot-sol- 
diers: viz., the velites, or light armed, who hovered in front; the 
hastati, so called because they anciently carried spears, and who 
formed the first fine of battle; the principes, so named because in 
early times they were put in front, and who formed the second line ; 
and the triarii, veterans who composed the third line. Each legion 



272 



ROME. 



contained from three to six thousand men. The legions were divided 
and subdivided into cohorts, companies {manipuli), and centuries. 
Arms and Mode of Warfare. — The national arm of the Ro- 
mans was the pilum, sl heavy iron-pointed spear, six feet long, and 
weighing ten or eleven pounds. This was thrown at a distance of 
ten to fifteen paces, after which the legionary came to blows with 
his stout, short sword. The velites began the battle with light 
javelins, and then retired behind the rest. The hastati, the prin- 
cipes, and the triarii, each, in turn, bore the brunt of the fight, and, 
if defeated, passed through 
intervals between the ma- 
nipuh of the other lines, and 
rallied in the rear. 




SIEGE OF A CITY. 



1 Later in Roman liistory the soldier ceased to be a citizen, and remained con- 
sfaa.ntly with the eagles until discharged. Marius arransed liis troops in two lines. 



THE CIVILIZATION. 273 

The Romans learned from the Greeks the use of military engines, 
and finally became experts in the art of sieges. Their principal 
machines were the hallista for throwing stones j the catapult iov 
hurling darts; the battering-ram (so called from the shape of the 
metal head) for breaching walls j and the movable tower ^ which 
could be pushed close to the fortifications, and so overlook them. 

On the march each soldier had to carry, besides his arms, grain 
enough to last from seventeen to thirty days, one or more wooden 
stakes, and often intrenching tools. When the army halted, 
even for a single night, a ditch was dug about the site for the 
camp, and a stout palisade made of the wooden stakes, to guard 
against a sudden attack. The exact size of the camp, and the 
location of every tent, street, etc., were fixed by a regular plan 
common to all the armies. 

Literature. — For about five centuries after the founding of 
Rome, there was not a Latin author. When a regard for letters at 
last arose, the tide of imitation set irresistibly toward Greece. Over 
two centuries after j:Eschylus and Sophocles contended for the 
Athenian prize, Livius Andronicus, a Greek slave, made the first 
Latin translation of Greek classics (about 240 B, c), and himself 
wrote and acted i plays whose inspiration was caught from the 
same source. His works soon became text-books in Roman 
schools, and were used till the time of VirgU. Ncevius, a soldier- 
poet, ''the last of the native minstrels," patterned after Eurip- 
ides in tragedy, and Aristophanes in comedy. The Romans 
resented the exposure of their national and personal weaknesses 
on the stage, sent the bold satirist to prison, and finally banished 
him. Ennius, the father of Latin song, called himself the 
''Roman Homer." He unblushingly borrowed from his great 
model, decried the native fashion of ballad-writing, introduced 
hexameter verse, and buUt up a new style of literature, closely 

and Caesar generally in three; but the terms hastati, principes, and triarii lost their 
significance. The place of tlie velites was taken by Cretan archers, Balearic slingers, 
and Gallic and German mercenaries. In time, the army was filled with foreigners; 
the heavy pilum and breastplate were thrown aside; all trace of Roman equipment 
and discipline disappeared, and the legion became a thing of the past. 

1 For a long time he was the only performer in these dramas. He recited the 
dialogues and speeches, and sang the lyrics to the accompaniment of a flute. So 
favorably was the new entertainment received by Roman audiences, and so often 
was the successful actor encored, that he lost his voice, and was obliged to hire a 
boy, who, hidden behind a curtain, sang the canticas, while Livius, in front, made 
the appropriate gestures. This custom afterward became common on the Roman 



274 ROME. 

founded on the Grecian.^ His '^Annals," a poetical Roman history, 
was for two centuries the national poem of Rome. Ennius, unhke 
NsBvius, flattered the ruling powers, and was rewarded by having 
his bust placed in the tomb of the Scipios. Plautus (254-184 B. c), 
who pictured with his coarse, vigorous, and brilliant wit the man- 
ners of his day, and Ter'ence (195-159 B. c.)> a learned and graceful 
humorist, were the two great comic poets of Rome.2 They were 
succeeded by Ludl'ius (148-103 b. c.)? a brave soldier and famous 
knight, whose sharp, fierce satire was poured relentlessly on Ro- 
man vice and folly. 

Among the early prose writers was Cato the Censor (234-149 B. c), 
son of a Sabine farmer, who was famous as lawyer, orator, sol- 
dier, and politician (p. 235). His hand-book on agriculture, "De 
Re Rustica," is still studied by farmers, and over one hundred and 
fifty of his strong, rugged orations find a place among the classics. 
His chief work, " The Origines," a history of Rome, is lost. 

Varro (116-28 B. c), *'the most learned of the Romans," first 
soldier, then farmer and author, wrote on theology, philosophy, 
history, agriculture, etc. He founded large libraries and a mu- 
seum of sculpture, cultivated the fine arts, and sought to awaken 
literary tastes among his countrymen. 

To the last century B. c. belong the illustrious names of Virgil 
and Horace, Cicero, Livy, and Sallust. First in order of birth was 

Cicero,'^ orator, essayist, and delightful letter- writer. Most elo- 

1 Ennius claimed that the soul of the old Greek bard had In its transmigration 
entered his body from its preceding home in a peacock. He so impressed his intel- 
lectual personality upon the Romans that they were sometimes called the " Ennian 
People." Cicero greatly admired his works, and Virgil borrowed as unscrupulously 
from Ennius, as Ennius had filched from Homer. 

2 It is noticeable that of all the poets we have mentioned, not one was born at 
Rome. lilvius was a slave from Magna Grsecia; Naevius was a native of Campania; 
Ennius was a Calabrian, who came to Rome as a teacher of Greek ; Plautus (meaning 
flat-foot— his name being, like Plato, a sobriquet) was an Umbrian, the son of a 
slave, and served in various menial employments before he began play- writing ; and 
Terence was the slave of a Roman senator. To be a Roman slave, however, was not 
incompatible with the possession of talents and education, since, by the pitiless 
rules of ancient warfare, the richest and most learned citizen of a captured town 
might become a drudge in a Roman household, or be sent to labor in the mines. 

3 Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 B. c), son of a book-loving, country gentleman, 
was educated at Rome, studied law and philosophy at Athens, traveled two years in 
Asia Minor, and then settled in Rome as an advocate. Plunging into the politics of 
his time, he soon became famous for his thrilling oratory, and was made, in succes- 
sion, quaestor, sedile, praetor, and consul. For his detection of Catiline's conspiracy, 
he received the title of Pater Patriae. His subsequent banishment, recall, and 
tragic death are historical (p. 248). Cicero was accused of being vain, vacillating, 
unamiable, and extravagant. He had an elegant mansion on the Palatine Hill, and 



THE CIVILIZATION. 275 

quent of all the Romans, his brilliant genius was not exhausted in 
the rude contests of the Forum and Basilica, but expanded in 
thoughtful pohtical essays and gossipy letters. Cicero studied 
Greek models, and his four orations on the ^' Conspiracy of Cati- 
line" rank not unfavorably with the Philippics of Demosthenes. 
His orations, used for lessons in Roman schools before he died, 
are, with his essays, "De Republica," "De Officiis," and "De 
Senectute," familiar Latin text-books of to-day. 

Sallust,^ a polished historian after the style of Thucydides, holds 
his literary renown by two short works, — ^'The Conspiracy of 
Catiline " and '^ The Jugurthine War," which are remarkable for 
their condensed vigor and vivid portrayal of character. 

Virgil^ and Horace, poet-friends of the Augustan age, are well 
known to us. Virgil left ten " Eclogues," or '^Bucolics," in which 
he patterned after Theocritus, a celebrated Sicilian poet of the 
Alexandrian agej ^'The Georgics," a work on Roman agriculture 
and stock-breeding, in confessed imitation of Hesiod's ^' Works 
and Days J " and the *'^neid," modeled upon the Homeric poems. 

numerous country villas, his favorite one at Tusculum being built on the plan of the 
Academy at Athens. Here he walked and talked with his friends in a pleasant imi- 
tation of Aristotle, and here he had a magnificent library of handsomely bound 
volumes, to which he continually added rare works, copied by his skillful Greek 
slaves. His favorite poet was Euripides, whose Medea (p. 169), it is said, he was 
reading when he was overtaken by his assassinators. 

1 Gains Sallustius Crispus (86-34 b. c), who was expelled from the senate for 
immorality, served afterward in the civil war, and was made governor of Numidia 
by Julius Caesar. He grew enormously rich on his provincial plunderiugs, and 
returned to Bome to build a magnificent palace on the edge of the Campus Martins, 
where, in the midst of beautiful gardens, groves, and flowers, he devoted his remain- 
ing years to study and friendship. 

2 The small paternal estate of Publius Virgilius Maro (70-19 B. C), which was 
confiscated after the fall of the republic, was restored to him by Augustus. The 
young country poet, who had been educated in Cremona, Milan, and Naples, ex- 
pressed his gratitude for the imperial favor in a Bucolic (shepherd-poem), one of 
several addressed to various friends. Their merit and novelty— for they were the first 
Latin pastorals— attracted the notice of Maecenas, the confidential adviser of the em- 
peror; and presently "the tall, slouching, somewhat plebeian figure of Virgil was 
seen among the brilliant crowd of statesmen, artists, poets, and historians who 
thronged the audience-chamber of the popular minister," in his sumptuous palace on 
the Esquiline Hill. Maecenas, whose wealth equaled his luxurious tastes, took great 
delight in encouraging men of letters, being himself well versed in Greek and Roman 
literature, the fine arts, and natural history. Acting upon his advice, Virgil wrote 
the Georgics, upon which he spent seven years. The ^neid was written to please 
Augustus, whose ancestry it traces back to the " pious JEneas " of Troy, the hero of 
the poem. In his last illness, Virgil, who had not yet polished his great work to suit 
his fastidious tastes, would have destroyed it but for the entreaties of his friends. 
In accordance with his dying request, he was buried near Naples, where his tomb 
is stiU shown above the PosUippo Grotto. 



276 



ROME. 



His tender, brilliant, graceful, musical lines are on the tongue of 
every Latin student. The '*^neid" became a text-book for the 
little Romans within fifty years after its author's death, and has 
never lost its place in the schoolroom. 




CICERO, VIRGIL, HORACE, AND SALLUST. 

Horace,'^ in his early writings, imitated Archilochus and Lucilius 
and himself says : — 

" The shafts of my passion at random I flung, 
And, dashing headlong into petulant rhyme, 
I recked neither where nor how fiercely I stung." 

Ode 1. 15. 



1 Quintus Horatius Flaccus (65-8 B. c), "the wit who never wounded, the poet 
who ever charmed, the friend who never failed," was the son of a freedman, who 
gave his boy a thorough Roman education, and afterward sent him to Athens,— still 
the school of the world. Here he joined the army of Brutus, but after the defeat at 
Philippi,— where his bravery resembled that of Archilochus and Alcasus (p. 164),— he 
returned to Rome to find his father dead, and all his little fortune confiscated. Of 
this time he afterward wrote:— 

'* Want stared me in the face ; so then and there 
I took to scribbling verse in sheer despair " 

The proceeds of his poems and the gifts of friends bought him a clerkship in the 
quaestor's department, and made him modestly independent. Virgil introduced liim 



THE CIVILIZATION. 277 

But his Mnd, genial nature soon tempered this "petulant rhyme." 
His " Satires " are rambhng, sometimes ironical, and always witty. 
Like Virgil, he loved to sing of country life. He wrote labori- 
ously, and carefully studied all his metaphors and phrases. His 
^' Odes" have a consummate grace and finish. 

Livy,'^ who outlived Horace by a quarter of a century, wrote one 
hundred and forty-two volumes of '' Roman History," beginning 
with the fabulous landing of ^neas, and closing with the death 
of Drusus (8 B. c). Thirty-five volumes remain. His grace, en- 
thusiasm, and eloquence make his pages delightful to read, though 
he is no longer accepted as an accurate historian. 

The 1st century A. D. produced the two Plinys, Tacitus, Ju- 
venal, and Seneca. 

Pliny the Elder^ is remembered for his '^ Natural History," a 
work of thirty-seven volumes, covering the whole range of the 
scientific knowledge of his time. 

Fliny the Younger, the charming letter- writer, and Tacitus, the 
orator and historian, two rich, eloquent, and distinguished noble- 
men, were among the most famous intellectual men of their time.3 

to Maecenas, who took him into an almost romantic friendship, lasting through 
life. From this generous patron he received the gift of the " Sabine Farm," to 
which he retired, and which he has immortalized by his descriptions. He died a 
few months after his *' dear knight Maecenas," to whom he had declared nearly a 
score of years before, 

" Ah, if untimely Fate should snatch thee hence, 

Thee, of my soul a part," 
"Think not that I have sworn a bootless oath, 
For we shall go, shall go, 
Hand linked in hand, where'er thou leadest, both 
The last sad road below." 
He was buried on the Esquiline Hill, by the side of his princely friend. 

1 Titus Livius (59 B. C.-17 A. D.). Little is known of his private life except that 
he was the friend of the Caesars. So great was his renown in his own time, that, ac- 
cording to legend, a Spaniard traveled from Cadiz to Korae to see him, looked upon 
him, and contentedly retraced his journey. 

2 Of this Pliny's incessant research, his nephew (Pliny the Younger) writes; 
" From the twenty-third of August he began to study at midnight, and through 
the winter he rose at one or two in the morning. During his meals a book 
was read to him, he taking notes while it went on, for he read nothing without 
making extracts. In fact he thought all time lost which was not given to study." 
Besides his Natural History, Pliny the Elder wrote over sixty books on History, 
Khetoric, Education, and Mifltary Tactics: he also left "one hundred and sixty 
volumes of Extracts, written on both sides of the leaf, and in the minutest hand." 
His eagerness to learn cost him his life, for he perished in approaching too near 
Vesuvius, in the great eruption which buried Pompeii and Herculaneum (79 A. D.). 

3 Tacitus was sitting one day in the circus, watching the games, when a stranger 
entered into a learned disquisition with him, and after a while inquired, "Are yau 



278 ROME. 

They scanned and criticised eacli other's manuscript, and became 
Joj their intimacy so linked with each other that they were jointly 
mentioned in people's wills, legacies to friends being a fashion of 
the day. Of the writings of Tacitus, there remain a part of the 
^'Annals" and the ^'History of Eome," a treatise on '^ Germany," 
and a ^^Life of Agricola." Of Phny, we have only the ^'Epistles" 
and a '^ Eulogium upon Trajan." The style of Tacitus was grave 
and stately, sometimes sarcastic or ironical ; that of Pliny was 
vivid, graceful, and circumstantial. 

Seneca (7 B. C.-65 A. d.), student, poet, orator, and stoic philoso- 
pher, employed his restless intellect in brilUant ethical essays, 
tragedies, and instructive letters written for the pubhc eye.^ His 
teachings were remarkable for their moral purity, and the Chris- 
tian Fathers called him "The Divine Pagan." 

Juvenal, the mocking, eloquent, cynical satirist, belongs to the 
close of the century. His writings are unsurpassed in scathing 
denunciations of vice. 2 

Libraries and Writing Materials. — The Eoman stationery dif- 
fered httle from the Grecian (p. 178). The passion for collecting 
books was so great that private libraries sometimes contained over 
sixty thousand volumes.^ The scrihce and librarii, slaves who were 
attached to library service, were an important part of a Roman 
gentleman's household. Fifty or a hundred copies of a book were 
often made at the same time, one scribe reading while the others 

of Italy or from the provinces'?"— "You know me from your reading," replied the 
historian. " Then," rejoined the other, " you must be either Tacitus or Pliny." 

1 Seneca was the tutor and guardian of the young Nero, and in later days carried 
his friendship so far as to write a defense of the murder of Agrippina. But Nero 
was poor and in debt ; Seneca was immensely rich. To charge him with conspiracy, 
sentence him to death, and seize his vast estates, was a policy characteristic of Nero. 
Seneca, then an old man, met his fate bravely and cheerfully. His young wife re- 
solved to die with him, and opened a vein in her arm with the same weapon with 
which he had punctured his own, but Nero ordered her wound to be ligatured. As 
Seneca suffered greatly in dying, his slaves, to shorten his pain, suffocated him in a 
vapor bath. 

2 Juvenal's style is aptly characterized in his description of another noted satirist : 

'• But when Lucilius, fired with virtuous rage, 
Waves his keen falchion o'er a guilty age, 
The conscious villain shudders at his sin. 
And burning bluslies speak the pangs within; 
Cold drops of sweat from every member roll, 
And growing terrors harrow up his soul." 

3 Seneca ridiculed the fashionable pretensions of illiterate men who "adorn their 
rooms with thousands of books, the titles of which are the delight of the yawning 
owner." 



THE CIVILIZATION, 



279 



wrote.^ Papyrus, as it was less expensive than parclinieni; was 
a favorite material. The thick black ink used in writing was 
made from soot and gum ; red ink was employed for ruhng the 
columns. The Egyptian reed-pen {calamus) was still in vogue. 




ROMAN LIBRARY. 

1 A book was written upon separate strips of papyrus. When the work was 
completed, the strips were glued together ; the last page was fastened to a hollow 
reed, over which the whole was wound ; the bases of the roll were carefully cut, 
smoothed, and dyed ; a small stick was passed through the reed, the ends of which 
were adorned with ivory, golden, or painted knobs (umbilici) ; the roll was wrapped in 
■parchment, to protect it from the ravages of worms, and the title-label was affixed:— 
the book was then ready for the library shelf or circular case (scrinium). The portrait 
of the author usually appeared on the first page, and the title of the book was written 
both at tlie beginning and the end. Sheets of parchment were folded and sewed in 
different sizes, like modern books.— An author read the first manuscript of his new 
work before as large an audience as he could command, and judged from its recep- 
tion whether it would pay to publish. " If you want to recite," says Juvenal, 
" Maculonus will lend you his house, will range his freedmen on the furthest benches, 
and will put in the proper places his strong-lunged friends (these corresponded to our 
modern claqueurs or hired applauders) ; but he will not give what it costs to hire 
the benches, set up the galleries, and fill the stage with chairs." These readings often 
became a bore, and Pliny writes : " This year has brought us a great crop of poets. 
Audiences come slowly and reluctantly ; even then they do not stop, but go away 
before the end ; some indeed by stealth, others with perfect openness." 



280 ROME. 

There were twenty-nine public libraries at Rome. The most 
important was founded by the emperor Trajan, and called — from 
his nomen (p. 270), Ulpius— the Ulpian Library. 

Education. — As early as 450 b. c. Rome had elementary schools, 
where boys and girls were taught reading, writing, arithmetic, and 
music. The Roman boy mastered his alphabet at home by play- 
ing with lettered blocks. At school he chanted the letters, syl- 
lables, and words in class, after the teacher's dictation. Arithmetic 
was learned by the aid of his fingers, or with stone counters and 
a tablet ruled in columns ; the counters expressing certain values, 
according to the columns on which they were placed. He learned 
to write on wax tablets (p. 178), his Httle fingers being guided by 
the firm hand of the master; afterward he used pen and ink, and 
the blank side of secondhand slips of papyrus.^ Boys of wealthy 
parents were accompanied to school by a slave, who carried their 
books, writing tablets, and counting boards, and also by a Greek 
pedagogue, who, among other duties, practiced them in his native 
language. Girls were attended by female slaves. 

Livius Andronicus opened a new era in school education. En- 
nius, Nsevius, and Plautus added to the Livian text-books, and 
the study of Greek became general. In later times there were ex- 
cellent higher schools where the masterpieces of Greek and Latin 
literature were carefully analyzed. State jurispradence was not 
neglected, and every schoolboy was expected to repeat the Twelve 
Tables from memory. Rhetoric and declamation were given great 
importance, and boys twelve years old made set harangues on 
the most solemn occasions.^ As at Athens, the boy of sixteen years 

1 The copies set for him were usually some moral maxim, and, doubtless, many a 
Roman schoolboy labored over that trite proverb quoted from Menander by Paul, 
and which still graces many a writing-book: "Evil communications corrupt good 
manners."— Bom an schoolmasters were very severe in the use of the ferula. Plautus 
says that for missing a single letter in his reading, a boy was " striped like his nurse's 
cloak" with the black and blue spots left by the rod. Horace, two centuries later, 
anathematized his teacher as OrMlius plagosus (Orbilius of the birch) ; and Martial, 
the witty epigrammatist and friend of Juvenal, declares that in his time " the morn- 
ing air resounded with the noise of floggings and the cries of suffering urchins." 

2 Julius Caesar pronounced in his twelfth year the funeral oration of his aunt, and 
Augustus performed a similar feat. The technical rules of rhetoric and declamation 
were so minute, that, wliile they gave no play for genius, they took away the risk of 
failure. Not only the form, the turns of thought, the cadences, everything except the 
actual words, were modeled to a pattern, but the manner, the movements, the ar- 
rangement of the dress, and the tones of the voice, were subject to rigid rules. The 
hair was to be sedulously coifed ; explicit directions governed the use of the hand- 
kerchief ; the orator's steps in advance or retreat, to right or to left, were all num- 
bered. He might rest only so many minutes on each foot, and place one only so 



THE CIVILIZATION. 



281 



formally entered into manhood, the 
event being celebrated with certain 
ceremonies at home and in the Forum 
and by the assumption of a new style 
of toga, or robe (p. 295). He could 
now attend the instruction of any phil- 
osopher or rhetorician he chose, and 
visit the Forum and Tribunals, being 
generally escorted by some man of 
note selected by his father. He finished 
his education by a course in Athens. 

Monuments and Art. — The early 
Italian temples were copied from the 
Etruscans ; the later ones were modifi- 
cations of the Grecian. Round temples 
(Etruscan) were commonly dedicated 
to Vesta or Diana j sometimes a dome ^ 
and portico were added, as in the 
Pantheon. 

The Basilica ^^ or Hall of Justice, 
was usually rectangular, and divided into three or five aisles by 
rows of columns, the middle aisle being widest. At the extremity 
was a semicircular, arched recess {apse) for the tribunal, in front 
of which was an altar, all important public business being pre- 
ceded by sacrifice. 

Magnificent Palaces were built by the Caesars, of which the 
Golden House of Nero, begun on the Palatine and extending by 
means of intermediate structures to the Esquiline, is a familiar 
example.^ At Tibur (the modern Tivoli), Hadrian had a variety 




ROMAN TOGA. 



many inches before the other ; the elbow must not rise above a certain angle ; the 
fiiigers should be set off with rings, but not too many or too large; and in raising 
the hand to exhibit them, care must be taken not to disturb the head-dress. Every 
emotion had its prescribed gesture, and tlie heartiest applause of the audience was 
for the perfection of the pantomime. This required incessant practice, and Augustus, 
it is said, never allowed a day to pass without spending an hour in declamation. 

1 Vaulted domes and large porticoes are characteristic of Roman architecture. 
The favorite column was the Corinthian, for which a new composite capital was in- 
vented. The foundation stone of a temple was laid on the day consecrated to the god 
to whom it was erected, and the building was made to face the point of the sun's 
rising on that morning. The finest specimens of Roman temple architecture are at 
Palmyra and Baalbec in Syria. 

2 The early Christian churches were all modeled after the Basilica. 

3 A court in front, surrounded by a triple colonnade a mile long, contained the em- 



282 ROME. 

of structures, imitating and named after the most celebrated 
buildings of different provinces, sucli as the Temple of Serapis 
at Canopus in Egypt, and the Lyceum and Academy at Athens. 
Even the Valley of Tempe, and Hades itself, were here typified 
in a labyrinth of subterranean chambers. 

In Military Roads, Bridges, Aqueducts, and Harbors, the Ro- 
mans displayed great genius. Even the splendors of Nero's golden 
house dwindle into nothing compared with the harbor of Ostia, 
the drainage works of the Fucinine Lake, and the two large aque- 
ducts. Aqua Claudia and Anio Nova.^ 

Military Roads. — Unlike the Greeks, who generally left their 
roads where chance or custom led, the Romans sent out their high- 
ways in straight lines from the capital, overcoming all natural dif- 
ficulties as they went; filling in hollows and marshes, or spanning 
them with viaducts; tunneling rocks and mountains; bridging 
streams and valleys; sparing neither labor nor money to make 
them perfect.2 Along the principal ones were placed temples, 

peror's statue, one hundred and twenty feet high. In other courts were gardens, 
vineyards, meadows, artificial ponds with rows of houses on their banks, and woods 
inhabited by tame and ferocious animals. Tlie walls of the rooms were covered with 
gold and jewels ; and the ivory with which the ceiling of the dining-halls was inlaid 
was made to slide back, so as to admit a rain of roses or fragrant waters on the heads 
of the caronsers. Under Otho, this gigantic building was continued at an expense of 
over $2,500,000, but only to be pulled down for the greater part by Vespasian. Titus 
erected his Baths on the EscLuiline foundation of the Golden Palace, and the Colos- 
seum covers the site of one of the ponds. 

1 The Lacus Fucinus in the country of the Marsi was the cause of dangerous inun- 
dations. To prevent this, and to gain the bed of the lake for agricultural pursuits, a 
shaft was cut through the solid rock from the lake down to the river Liris, whence 
the water was discharged into the Mediterranean. The work occupied thirty 
thousand men for eleven years. The Aqua Claudia was fed by two springs in the 
Sabine mountain, and was forty-five Roman miles in length; the Anio Nova, fed 
from the river Anio, was sixty-two miles long. These aqueducts extended partly 
above and partly under ground, until about six miles from Rome, where they joined, 
and were carried one above the other on a common structure of arches— in some 
places one hundred and nine feet high— into the citJ^ 

2 In building a road, the line of direction was first laid out, and the breadth, which 
was usually from thirteen to fifteen feet, marked by trenches. The loose earth be- 
tween the trenches having been excavated till a firm base was reached, the space 
was filled up to the proposed height of the road, wliich was sometimes twenty feet 
above the solid ground. First was placed a layer of small stones ; next broken 
stones cemented with lime ; then a mixture of lime, clay, and beaten fragments of 
brick and pottery; and finally a mixture of pounded gravel and lime, or a pavement 
of hard, flat stones, cut into rectangular slabs or irregular polygons. All along the 
roads milestones were erected. Near the Arch of Septiniius Severus in the Roman 
Forum may still be seen the remains of the " Golden Milestone " (erected by Augus- 
tus),— a gilded marble iiillar on which were recorded tlie names of the roads, and 
their length from the metropolis. 



THE CIVILIZATION. 



283 



triumphal arclies, and sepulchral monuments. The Appian Way 
— called also Regina Viarum (Queen of Roads) — was famous for 
the number, beauty, and richness of its tombs. Its foundations 
were laid 312 B. c. by the censor Appius Claudius, from whom it 
was named. 




BRIDGE OF ST. ANGBLO, AND HADRIAN'S TOMB (RESTORED). 

The Roman Bridges and Viaducts are among the most remarkable 
monuments of antiquity. In Greece, where streams were narrow, 
little attention was paid to bridges, which were usually of wood, 
resting at each extremity upon stone piers. The Romans applied 
the arch, of which the Greeks knew little or nothing, to the con- 
struction of massive stone bridges i crossing the wide rivers of their 
various provinces. In like manner, marshy places or valleys liable 
to inundation were spanned by viaducts resting on solid arches. 
Of these bridges, which may still be seen in nearly every corner of 
the old Roman Empire, one of the most interesting is the Pons 



1 lu early times the bridges across the Tiher were recfarded as sacred, and their 
care was confided to a special hody of priests, called ponti/ices (bridge-makers). The 
name of Pontifex 3Iaximus i-emained attached to the liigh priest, and was worn by 
the Roman emperor. It is now given to the Pope. Bridges were sometimes made 
of wood-work and masonry combined. 



284 ROME. 

-^lius, now called the Bridge of St. Angelo, built by Hadrian 
across the Tiber in Rome. 

Aqueducts were constructed on the most stupendous scale, and 
at one time no less than twenty stretched their long hues of 
arches i across the Campagna, bringing into the heart of the city 
as many streams of water from scores of miles away. 

In their stately Harbors the Eomans showed the same defiance 
of natural difficulties. The lack of bays and promontories was 
supplied by dams and walls built far out into the sea | and even 
artificial islands were constructed to protect the equally artificial 
harbor. Thus, at Ostia, three enormous pillars, made of chalk, 
mortar, and Pozzuolan clay, were placed upright on the deck of a 
colossal ship, which was then sunk ; the action of the salt water 
hardening the clay, rendered it indestructible, and formed an 
island foundation. ^ Other islands were made by sinking flat vessels 
loaded with huge blocks of stone. Less imposing, but no less use- 
ful, were the canals and ditches, by means of which swamps and 
bogs were transformed into arable landj and the subterranean 
sewers in Rome, which, built twenty-five hundred years ago, still 
serve their original purpose. 

Triumphal Arches,'^ erected at the entrance of cities, and across 
streets, bridges, and public roads, in honor of victorious generals 
or emperors, or in commemoration of some great event, were 
pecuHar to the Romans ; as were also the 

Amphitheaters,^ the Flavian, better known as the Colosse'um, 
being the most famous. This structure was built mostly of blocks 

1 Their remains, striking across tlie desolate Campagna in various directions, and 
covered with ivy, maiden-hair, wild flowers, and fig-trees, form one of the most pic- 
turesque features in the landscape ahout Rome. " Wherever you go, these arches 
are visible ; and toward nightfall, glowing in the splendor of a Roman sunset, and 
printing their lengthening sun-looped shadows upon the illuminated slopes, they look 
as if the hand of Midas had touched them, and changed their massive blocks of cork- 
like travertine into crusty courses of molten golA."— Story's Boha di Hoina. 

2 Many of these arches still remain. The principal ones in Rome are those of 
Titus and Constantine, near the Colosseum, and that of Septimius Severus in the 
Roman Forum. The Arch of Titus, built of white marble, commemorates the de- 
struction of Jerusalem. On the bas-reliefs of the mterior are represented the golden 
table, the seven-branched candlestick, and other precious spoils from the Jewish 
Temple, carried in triumphal procession by the victors. To this day no Jew wUl 
walk under this arch. 

3 The Roman theater differed little from the Grecian (p. 187, note). The first 
amphitheater, made in the time of Julius Caesar, consisted of two wooden theaters, so 
placed upon pivots that they could be wheeled around, spectators and all, and eithei' 
set back to back, for two separate dramatic performances, or face to face, making a 
closed arena for gladiatorial shows. 



THE CIVILIZATION. 



285 



of travertine, clamped witli iron and faced with marble; it covered 
about five acres, and seated eighty thousand persons. At its 
dedication by Titus (a. d. 80), which lasted a hundred days, five 
thousand wild animals were thrown into the arena. It continued 
to be used for gladiatorial and wild-beast fights for nearly four 
hundred years. On various public occasions it was splendidly 
fitted up with gold, silver, or amber furniture. 




THE RUINS OF THE COLOSSEUM. 



The ThermcB (public baths, literally warm waters) were constructed 
on the grandest scale of refinement and luxury. The Baths of 
Caracalla, at Rome, contained sixteen hundred rooms, adorned with 
precious marbles. Here were painting and sculpture galleries, 
libraries and museums, porticoed halls, open groves, and an impe- 
rial palace. 

The arts of Painting, Sculpture, and Pottery were borrowed first 
from the Etruscans, and then from the Greeks ; ^ in mosaics the 



1 " Roman art," says ZerflS, " is a misnomer; it is Etruscan, Greek, Assyrian, and 
Egyptian art, dressed in an eclectic Roman garb by foreign artists. Tlie Pantheon 
contained a Greek statue of Venus, which, it is said, had in one ear the half of the 
pearl left by Cleopatra. To ornament a Greek marble statue representing a goddess 
with part of the earring of an Egyptian princess is highly characteristic of Roman 
taste in matters of art." 



286 ROME. 

Romans excelled. ^ In later times Eome was filled with the mag 
nificent spoils taken from conquered provinces, especially Greece. 
Greek artists flooded the capital, bringing their native ideality to 
serve the ambitious desii'es of the more practical Romans, whose 
dwellings grew more and more luxurious, until exquisitely fres- 
coed walls, mosaic pavements, rich paintings, and marble statues 
became common ornaments in hundreds of elegant villas. 

3. THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 

General Character. — However much they might eome in contact, 
the Roman and the Greek character never assimilated. We have seen 
the Athenian quick at intuition, polished in manner, art-loving, beauty- 
worshiping; fond of long discussions and philosophical discourses, 
and listening all day to sublime tragedies. We find the Roman grave, 
steadfast, practical, stern, unsympathizing ; 2 too loyal and sedate to 
indulge in much discussion ; too unmetaphysieal to relish philosophy ; 
and too unideal to enjoy tragedy. The Spartan deified endurance ; 
the Athenian worshiped beauty; the Roman was embodied dignity. 
The Greeks were proud and exclusive, but not uncourteous to other 
nations ; the Romans had but one word (liostis) for strangers and 
enemies. Ambitious, determined, unflinching, they pushed their 
armies in every direction of the known world, and, appropriating 
every valuable achievement of the peoples they conquered, made all 

1 The mosaic floors, composed of bits of marble, glass, and valuable stones, were 
often of most elaborate designs. One discovered in the so-called House of the Faun, 
at Pompeii, is a remarkable battle scene, supposed to represent Alexander at Issus. 
It is preserved, somewhat mutilated, in the museum at Naples. 

2 What we call sentiment was almost unknown to the Romans. The Greeks 
had a word to express affectionate family love ; the Romans had none. Cicero, 
whom his countrymen could not understand, was laughed at for his grief at the death 
of his daughter. The exposure of infants was sanctioned as in Greece,— girls, espe- 
cially, suffering from this unnatural custom,— and the power of the Roman father 
over the life of his children was paramount. Yet Roman fathers took much pains 
with their boys, sharing in their games and pleasures, directing their habits, and 
taking them about town. Horace writes gratefully of his father, who remained with 
him at Rome during his school-days and was his constant attendant.— (Satire I. 4. 

It is not strange, considering their indifference to their kindred, that the Romans 
were cruel and heartless to their slaves. In Greece, even the helot was granted some 
little consideration as a human being, but in Rome the unhappy captive— who may 
have been a prince in his own land— was but a chattel. The lamprey eels in a certain 
nobleman's fish-pond were fattened on the flesh of his bondmen ; and, if a Roman 
died suspiciously, all his slaves— who sometimes were numbered by thousands- 
were put to the torture. The women are accused of being more pitiless than the 
men, and the faces of the ladies' maids bore perpetual marks of the blows, scratches, 
and pin-stabs of their petulant mistresses. 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 287 

the borrowed arts their own, lavishing the precious spoils upon their 
beloved Rome. Their pride in Roman citizenship amounted to a pas- 
sion, and for the prosperity of their capital they were ready to re- 
nounce the dearest personal hope, and to cast aside all mercy or justice 
toward every other nation. 

Religion, — The Romans, like the Greeks, worshiped the powers 
of nature. But the Grecian gods and goddesses were living, loving, 
hating, quarrelsome beings, with a history full of romantic incident 
and personal adventure ; the Roman deities were solemn abstractions 
mysteriously governing every human action, i and requiring constant 
propitiation with vows, prayers, gifts, and sacrifices. A regular system 
of bargaining existed between the Roman worshiper and his gods. 
If he performed all the stipulated religious duties, the gods were 
bound to confer a reward ; if he failed in the least, the divine ven- 
geance was sure. At the same time, if he could detect a flaw in 
the letter of the law, or shield himself behind some doubtful techni- 
cality, he might cheat the gods with impunity. 2 There was no room 
for faith, or hope, or love — only the binding nature of legal forms. 
Virtue, in our modern sense, was unknown, and piety consisted, as 
Cicero declares, in ^'justice toward the gods." 

In religion, as in everything else, the Romans were always ready 
to borrow from other nations. Their image-worship came from the 
Etruscans ; their only sacred volumes 3 were the purchased '^ Sibylline 
Books ; " they drew upon the gods of Greece, until in time they had 
transferred and adopted nearly the entire Greek Pantheon ; ^ Phoenicia 

1 The farmer had to satisfy "the spirit of breaking up the land and the spirit of 
plowing it crosswise, the spirit of furrowing and the spirit of harrowing, the spirit 
of weeding and the spirit of reaping, the spirit of carrying the grain to the barn and 
the spirit of bringing it out again." The little child was attended by over forty 
gods. Vaticanus taught him to cry; Fabullnus, to speak; Edusa, to eat; Potlna, to 
drink; Abeona conducted him out of the house; Interduca guided him on his way; 
Domlduca led him home, and Adeona brought him In. 

2 "If a man offered wine to Father Jupiter, and did not mention very precisely 
that It was only the cup-full which he held in his hand, the god might claim the whole 
year's vintage. On the other hand, If the god required so many heads in sacrifice, by 
the letter of the bond he would be bound to accept garlic-heads ; If he claimed an 
animal. It might be made out of dough or wax."— TTiJfcms's Roman Antiquities. 

3 The Egyptians had their Ritual; the Hindoos, their Vedas; the Chinese, their 
Laws of Confucius; the Hebrews, the Psalms and prayers of David; but neither 
Greeks nor Romans had books such as these. They had poetry of the highest order, 
but no psalms or hymns, litanies or prayers. 

4 Jupiter (Zeus) and Vesta (Hestla) were derived by Greeks and Romans from 
their common ancestors. Among the other early Italian gods were Mars (afterward 
identified with the Greek Ares), Hercules (Herakles), Juno (Hera), Minerva (Athena), 
and Neptune (Poseidon). The union of the Palatine Romans with the Qulrinal 
Sablnes was celebrated by the mutual worship of Qulrlnus, and a gate called the 
Janus was erected in the valley, afterward the site of the Forum. This gate was 



288 



ROME. 



and Phrygia lent their deities to swell the 
list ; and finally our old Egyptian friends, 
Isis, Osiris, and Serapis, became as much 
at home upon the Tiber as they had been 
for ages on the Nile. The original religious 
ideas of the Romans can only be inferred 
from a few peculiar rites which character- 
ized their worship. The Chaldeans had 
astrologers ; the Persians had magi ; the 
Greeks had sibyls and oracles ; the Romans 
had 
Augurs. Practical and unimaginative, the 
Latins would never have been content to learn 
the divine will through the ambiguous phrases 
of a human prophet ; they demanded a direct yes 
or no from the gods themselves. Augurs existed 
from the time of Romulus. Without their as- 
sistance no public act or ceremony could be 
performed. Lightning and the flight of birds 
were the principal signs by which the gods were 
supposed to make known their will ; i some 
birds of omen communicated by their cry, others by their manner of 
flight. 

The Harnspices, who also expounded lightnings and natural phe- 
nomena, made a specialty of divination by inspecting the internal 
organs of sacrificed animals, a custom we have seen in Greece (p. 185). 




ROMAN AUGUR. 



d 



always open in time of war, and closed in time of peace. All gates and doors were 
sacred to the old Latin god Janus, whose key iitted every lock. He wore two faces, 
one before and one behind, and was the god of all beginnings and endings, all open- 
ings and shuttings.— With the adoption of the Greek gods, the Greek ideas of per- 
sonality and mythology were introduced, the Romans being too unimaginative to 
originate any myths for themselves. But, out of the hardness of their own character, 
they disfigured the original conception of every borrowed god, and made him more 
jealous, threatening, merciless, revengeful, and inexorable than before. "Among 
the thirty thousand deities with which they peopled the visible and invisible worlds, 
there was not one divinity of kindness, mercy, or comfort." 

1 In taking tlie auspices, the augur stood in the center of a con- N 

secrated square, and divided the sky with his staff into quarters (cut) ; 
he then offered his prayers, and, turning to tlie south, scanned the 
heavens for a reply. Coming from the left, the signs were favorable; 
from the right, unfavorable. If the first signs were not desirable, 
the augurs had only to wait until the right ones came. They thus ® 

compelled the gods to sanction their decisions, from which there was afterward no 
appeal. In the absence of an augur, the "Sacred Chickens," which were carried 
about in coops during campaigns, were consulted. If they ate their food greedily, 
especially if they scattered it, the omen was favorable; if they refused to eat, or 
moped in the coop, evil was anticipated. 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 289 

Their art was never much esteemed by the more enlightened classes ; 
and Cato, who detested their hypocrisy, wondered ''how one haruspex 
could look at another in the streets without laughing." 

The Fattiily Worship of Vesta, goddess of the hearth, was more 
exclusive in Rome than in Greece, where slaves joined in the home 
devotions. A Roman father, himself the priest at this ceremony, 
would have been shocked at allowing any but a kinsman to be present, 
for it included the worship of the Lares and Penates, the spirits of 
his ancestors and the guardians of his house. So, also, in the public 
service at the Temple of Vesta, the national hearth-stone, the patricians 
felt it a sacrilege for any but themselves to join. The worship of 
Vesta, Saturnus (the god of seed-sowing), and Opo (the harvest god- 
dess) was under the direction of the 

College of Pontifices, of which, in regal times, the king was high 
priest. Attached to this priestly college — the highest in Rome — were 
the Flamens'^ (flare, to blow the fire), who were priests of Jupiter, 
Mars, and Quirinus ; and the Vestal Virgins, who watched the eternal 
fire in the Temple of Vesta. 2 

TJie Salii, or "leaping priests," receive their name from the war- 
like dance which, in full armor, they performed every March be- 
fore all the temples. They had the care of the Sacred Shields, which 
they carried about in their annual processions, beating them to the 

1 The Flamen Dialis (Priest of Jupiter) was forbidden to take an oath, mount a 
horse, or glance at an army. His hand could touch nothing unclean, and he never 
approached a corpse or a tomb. As he must not look at a fetter, the ring on his 
finger was a broken one, and, as he could not wear a knot, histliiek woolen toga, 
woven by his wife, was fastened with buckles. (In Egypt, we remember, priests 
were forbidden to wear woolen, p, 20.) If his head-dress (a sort of circular pillow, on 
the top of which an olive-branch was fastened by a white woolen thread) chanced to 
fall off, he was obliged to resign his office. In his belt he carried the sacrificial knife, 
and in his hand he held a rod to keep off the people on his way to sacrifice. As he 
might not look on any secular employment, he was preceded by a lictor, who com- 
pelled every one to lay down his work till the Flamen had passed. His duties were 
continuous, and he could not remain for a night away from his house on the Palatine. 
His wife was subject to an equally rigid code. She wore long woolen robes, and 
shoes made of the leather of sacrificed animals. Her hair was tied with a purple 
woolen ribbon, over which was a kerchief, fastened with a twig from a lucky tree. 
She also carried a sacrificial knife. 

2 The Vestal always dressed in white, with a broad band, like a diadem, round 
her forehead. During sacrifice or in processions she was covered with a white veil. 
She was chosen for the service when from six to ten years old, and her vows held for 
thirty years, after which time, if she chose, she was released and might marry. 
Any off'ense offered her was punished with death. In public, every one, even the 
consul, made way for the lictor preceding the maiden, and she had the seat of honor 
at all public games and priestly banquets. If, however, she accidentally suffered the 
sacred fire to go out, she was liable to corporeal punishment by the pontifex maxi- 
mus ; if she broke her vows, she was carried on a bier to the Campus Sceleratus, 
beaten with rods, and buried alive. The number of vestal virgins never exceeded 
six at any one time. 



290 ROME. 

time of an old song in praise of Janus, Jupiter, Juno, Minerva, 
and Mars. One of the shields was believed to have fallen from 
heaven. To mislead a possible pillager of so precious a treasure, 
eleven more were made exactly like it, and twelve priests were ap- 
pointed to watch them all. 

The Fetiales had charge of the sacred rites accompanying declara- 
tions of war, or treaties of peace. War was declared by throwing a 
bloody spear across the enemy's frontier. A treaty was concluded by 
the killing of a pig with a sacred pebble. 

Altars were erected to the emperors, where vows and prayers 
were daily offered.! In the times of Roman degeneracy the city was 
flooded with quack Chaldean astrologers, Syrian seers, and Jewish 
fortune-tellers. The women, especially, were ruled by these corrupt 
impostors, whom they consulted in secret and by night, and on whom 
they squandered immense sums. Under these debasing influences, 
profligacies and enormities of every kind grew and multiplied. The 
old Roman law which commanded that the parricide should be 
''sewn up in a sack with a viper, an ape, a dog, and a cock, and then 
cast into the sea," was not likely to be rigidly enforced when a parri- 
cide sat on the throne, and poisonings were common in the palace. 
That the pure principles of Christianity, which were introduced at 
this time, should meet with contempt, and its disciples with bitter 
persecution, was inevitable. 

Games and Festivals. — The Roman public games were a degraded 
imitation of the Grecian, and, like them, connected with religion. 
When a divine favor was desired, a vow of certain games was made, 
and, as the gods regarded promises with suspicion, the expenses were 
at once raised. Each of the great gods had his own festival month 
and day. 

The Saturnalia, which occurred in December, and which in later 
times lasted seven days, was the most remarkable. It was a time of 
general mirth and feasting ; schools were closed ; the senate adjourned ; 
presents were made; wars were forgotten; criminals had certain 
privileges ; and the slaves, whose lives were ordinarily at the mercy 
of their masters, were permitted to jest with them, and were even 
waited upon by them at table;— all this in memory of the free and 
happy rule of ancient Saturn. 

The gymnastic and musical exercises of the Greeks never found 
much favor in Rome ; tragedies were tolerated only for the splendor 
of the costumes and the scenic wonders ; and even comedies failed to 

1 " Not even the Egyptians, crouching in grateful admiration before a crocodile, so 
outraged humanity as did those polite Romans, rendering divine honors to an em- 
peror like Aurelius Commodus, who fought seven hundred and thirty-five times as a 
common gladiator in the arena before his enervated people."— Zer^. 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 



291 



satisfy a Roman audience. Farces and pantomimes won great ap- 
plause ; horse and chariot races were exciting pleasures from the time 
of the kings ; but, of all delights, nothing could stir Rome like a 
gladiatorial or wild-beast fight. At first connected with the Saturnalia, 
the sports of the arena soon became too popular to be restricted, and 
mourning sons in high life paid honors to a deceased father by 
furnishing a public fight, in which from twenty-five to seventy-five 
gladiators were hired to take part, the contest often lasting for days. 




TEIE GLADIATORS (" POLLICE VEUSO," PAINTING BY G^ROME). 

Gladiatorial Shows were advertised by private circulars or public 
announcements. On the day of the performance, the gladiators marched 
in solemn procession to the arena, where they were matched in pairs, 1 

1 The gladiators fought in pairs or in matched numbers. A favorite duel was 
between a man without arms, but who can ied a net in which to insnare his opponent, 
and a three-pronged fork with which to spear him when caught, and another man in 
full armor, whose safety lay in evading his enemy while he pursued and killed him. 
"It is impossible to describe the aspect of an amphitheater when gladiators 
fought. The audience became frantic with excitement ; tliey rose from their seats; 
they yelled ; they shouted their applause as a ghastly blow was dealt which sent the 
life-blood spouting forth. 'Hoc habet'—'he has it'— 'he has it,' burst from ten 
thousand throats, and was re-echoed, not only by a brutalized populace, but by 



292 ROME. 

and their weapons formally examined. "An awning gorgeous with 
purple and gold excluded the rays of the mid-day sun; sweet strains 
of music floated in the air, drowning the cries of death ; the odor of 
Syrian perfumes overpowered the scent of blood ; the eye was feasted 
by the most brilliant scenic decorations, and amused by elaborate 
machinery." At the sound of a bugle and the shout of command, the 
battle opened. "When a gladiator was severely wounded, he dropped 
his weapons, and held up his forefinger as a plea for his life. This 
was sometimes in the gift of the people ; often the privilege of the 
vestal virgins j in imperial times, the prerogative of the emperor. A 
close-pressed thumb or the waving of a handkerchief meant mercy; 
an extended thumb and clinched upright fist forbade hope. Cowards 
had nothing to expect, and were whipped or branded with hot irons 
till they resumed the fight. The killed and mortally wounded were 
dragged out of the arena with a hook. 

The Wild-beast Fights were still more revolting, especially when 
untrained captives or criminals were forced to the encounter. Many 
Christian martyrs, some of whom were delicate women, perished in 
the Colosseum. We read of twenty maddened elephants turned in 
upon six hundred war captives ; and in Trajan's games, which lasted 
over one hundred and twenty days, ten thousand gladiators fought, and 
over that number of wild beasts were slain. Sometimes the animals, 
made furious by hunger or fire, were let loose at one another. Great 
numbers of the most ferocious beasts were imported from distant 
countries for these combats. Strange animals were sought after, and 
camelopards, white elephants, the rhinoceros, and the hippopotamus, 
goaded to fury, delighted the assembled multitudes. Noble game be- 
came scarce, and at last it was forbidden by law to kill a Getulian lion 
out of the arena, even in self-defense. 

Naval Fights, in flooded arenas, were also popular. The Colosseum 
was sometimes used for this purpose, as many as thirty vessels taking 
part. At an entertainment given by Augustus in the flooded arena of 
the Flaminian Circus, thirty-six crocodiles were pursued and killed. 

Marriage was of two kinds. In one the bride passed from the 
control of her father into that of her husband; in the other the 

imperial lips, by purple-clad senators and knights, by noble matrons and consecrated 
maids."— (S'Tiepi^arti's Fall of Rome. So frenzied with the sight of blood did the 
spectators become, that they would rush into the arena and slay on every side . and 
so sweet was the applause of the mob, that captives, slaves, and criminals were envied 
the monopoly of the gladiatorial contest, and laws were required to restrict knights 
and senators from entering the lists. Some of the emperors fouglit publicly in the 
arena, and even women thus debased themselves. Finally, sucli was the mania, that 
no wealthy or patrician family was without its gladiators, and no festival was com- 
plete without a contest. Even at banquets, blood was the only stimulant that roused 
the jaded appetite of a Roman. 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 



293 




DRESSING A ROMAN BRIDE. 



parental power was retained. The former kind of marriage could be 
contracted in any one of three different ways. Of these, the religious 
form was confined to the patricians ; the 
presence of the pontifex maximus, the priest 
of Jupiter, and ten citizens, was necessary 
as witnesses ; a sacred cake {far) was 
broken and solemnly tasted by the nuptial 
pair, whence this ceremony was termed 
confarreatio. A second manner was by pur- 
chase {coemptio), in which the father for- 
mally sold his daughter to the groom, she 
signifying her consent before witnesses. 
The third form, by prescription (usus), con- 
sisted simply in the parties having lived 
together for a year without being separated 
for three days at any time. 

The marriage ceremony proper differed 
little in the various forms. The betrothal 
consisted of the exchange of the words 
spondesne (Do you promise?) and spondeo (I 
promise), followed by the gift of a ring 
from the groom. On the wedding-morn- 
ing, the guests assembled at the house 

of the bride's father, where the auspices — which had been taken 
before sunrise by an augur or a haruspex — were declared, and the 
solemn marriage contract was spoken. The bride's attendant then 
laid her hands upon the shoulders of the newly married pair, and led 
them to the family altar, around which they walked hand in hand, 
while a cow, a pig, and a sheep were offered in sacrifice — the gall 
having been first extracted and thrown away, to signify the removal 
of all bitterness from the occasion. The guests having made their 
congratulations, the feast began. At nightfall the bride was torn 
with a show of force from her mother's arms (in memory of the seizure 
of the Sabine women, p. 206) ; two boys, whose parents were both 
alive, supported her by the arms ; torches were lighted, and a gay 
procession, as in Greece, accompanied the party to the house of the 
groom. Here the bride, having repeated to her spouse the formula, 
'* Ubi tu Caius, ibi ego Caia " (Where thou art Caius, I am Caia), 
anointed the door-posts and wound them with wool, and was lifted 
over the threshold. She was then formally welcomed into the atrium 
by her husband with the ceremony of touching fire and water, in which 
both participated. The next day, at the second marriage feast, the wife 
brought her offerings to the gods of her husband's family, of which she 
was now a member, and a Roman matron. 



294 ROME. 

Burial.^ — ^When a Roman died it was the duty of his nearest rela- 
tive to receive his last breath with a kiss, and then to close Ms eyes 
and mouth (compare ^neid, iv. 684). His name was now called sev- 
eral times by all present, and, there being no response, the last fare- 
well (vale) was said. The necessary utensils and slaves having been 
hired at the temple where the death registry was kept, the body was 
laid on the ground, washed in hot water, anointed with rich perfumes, 
clad in its best garments, placed on an ivory bedstead, and covered 
with blankets of purple, embroidered with gold. 2 The couch was deco- 
rated with flowers and foliage, but upon the body itself were placed 
only the crowns of honor fairly earned during its lifetime ; these 
accompanied it into the tomb. By the side of the funereal bed, which 
stood in the atrium facing the door, as in Greece, was placed a pan of 
incense. The body was thus exhibited for seven days, branches of 
cypress and fir fastened in front of the house announcing a mourning 
household to all the passers-by. On the eighth morning, while the 
streets were alive with bustle, the funeral took place. Behind the 
hired female mourners, who sang wailing dirges, walked a band of 
actors, who recited scraps of tragedy applicable to the deceased, or 
acted comic scenes in which were sometimes mimicked his personal 
peculiarities. 3 In front of the bier marched those who personated the 
prominent ancestors of the dead person. They wore waxen masks 
(p. 303), in which and in their dress were reproduced the exact features 
and histofic garb of these long-defunct personages.^ The bier, car- 
ried by the nearest relatives, or by slaves freed by the will of the 
deceased, and surrounded by the family friends dressed in black (or, in 
imperial times, in white), was thus escorted to the Forum. Here the 
mask-wearers seated themselves about it, and one of the relatives 
mounted the rostrum to eulogize the deceased and his ancestors. 
After the eulogy, the procession re-formed, and the body was taken to 

1 The Romans, like the Greeks, attached great importance to the interment of 
their dead, as they believed that the spirit of an unhuried body was forced to wander 
for a hundred years. Hence it was deemed a religious duty to scatter earth over any 
corpse found uncovered by the wayside, a handful of dust being sufficient to appease 
the infernal gods. If the body of a friend could not be found, as in shipwreck, an 
empty tomb was erected, over which the usual rites were performed. 

2 We are supposing the case of a rich man. The body of a poor person was, after 
the usual ablutions, carried at night to the common burial-ground outside the Esqui- 
line gate, and interred without ceremony. 

3 At Vespasian's obsequies an actor ludicrously satirized his parsimony. "How 
much will this ceremony cost?" he asked in the assumed voice of the deceased 
emperor. A large sum having been named in reply, the actor extended his hand, and 
greedily cried out, " Give me the money and throw my body into the Tiber." 

4 Frequently the masks belonging to the collateral branches of the family were 
borrowed, that a brilliant show might be made. Parvenus, who belong to all time, 
were wont to parade images of fictitious ancestors. 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 295 

the spot where it was to be buried or burned, both forms being used, 
as in Greece. If it were burned, the nearest relative, with averted 
face, lighted the pile. After the burning, the hot ashes were drenched 
with wine, and the friends collected the bones in the folds of their 
robes, amid acclamations to the manes of the departed. The remains, 
sprinkled with wine and milk, were then — with sometimes a small 
glass vial filled with tears — placed in the funeral urn ; a last farewell 
was spoken, the lustrations were performed, and the mourners sep- 
arated. When the body was not burned, it was buried with all its 
ornaments in a coffin, usually of stone. ^ The friends, on returning 
home from the funeral, were sprinkled with water, and then they 
stepped over fire, as a purification. The house also was ceremoniously 
purified. An offering aud banquet took place on the ninth day after 
burial, in accordance with Greek custom. 

Dress. — The toga, worn by a Roman gentleman, was a piece of 
white woolen cloth about five yards long and three and a half wide, 
folded lengthways, so that one edge fell below the other. It was thrown 
over the left shoulder, brought around the back and under the right 
arm, then, leaving a loose fold in front, thrown again over the left 
shoulder, leaving the end to fall behind. Much pains was taken to 
drape it gracefully, according to the exact style required by fashion. 
A tunic, with or without sleeves, and in cold weather a vest, or one 
or more extra tunics, were worn under the toga. Boys under seventeen 
years of age wore a toga with a purple hem ; the toga of a senator had 
a broad purple stripe, and that of a knight had two narrow stripes. 
The use of the toga was forbidden to slaves, strangers, and, in im- 
perial times, to banished Romans. 

The pcenula, a heavy, sleeveless cloak, with sometimes a hood 
attached, and the lacerna, a thinner, bright-colored one arranged in 
folds, were worn out of doors over the toga. The paludamentum, a 
rich, red cloak draped in picturesque folds, was permitted only to the 
military general-in- chief, who, in imperial times, was the emperor 
himself. The sagum was a short military cloak. The synthesis, a gay- 
colored easy robe, was worn over the tunic at banquets, and by the 
nobility during the Saturnalia. Poor people had only the tunic, and 
in cold weather a tight-fitting wool or leather cloak. When not on a 
journey, the Roman, like the Greek, left his head uncovered, or pro- 
tected it with his toga. Rank decided the style of shoe ; a consul used 
a red one, a senator a black one with a silver crescent, ordinary folk 
a plain black, slaves and poorest people wooden clogs. In the house, 
sandals only were worn, and at dinner even these were laid aside. 

1 That from Assos in Lycia was said to consume the entire body, except the teeth, 
in forty days: hence it was called sarcophagus (flesh-eating), a name which came to 
stand for any coflan. 



296 ROME. 

A Roman matron dressed in a linen under-tunic, a vest, and the 
Btola, a long, short-sleeved garment, girdled at the waist and flounced 
or hemmed at the bottom. Over this, when she went out, she threw 
a palla, cut and draped like her husband's toga or like the Greek 
himation. Girls and foreign women, who were not permitted the stola, 
wore over the tunic a palla, arranged like the Doric chiton (p. 193). 
Women — who, like the men, went hatless — protected their heads with 
the palla, and wore veils, nets, and various light head-coverings. 
This led to elaborate fashions in hair-dressing, A caustic soap im- 
ported from Gaul was used for hair-dyeing, and wigs were not uncom- 
mon. Bright colors, such as blue, scarlet, violet, and especially 
yellow, — the favorite tint for bridal veils, — enlivened the feminine 
wardrobe. Finger-rings were worn in profusion by both sexes, and 
a Roman lady of fashion luxuriated in bracelets, necklaces, and various 
ornaments set with diamonds, pearls, emeralds, and other jewels, 
whose purchase frequently cost her husband his fortune. 

SCENES IN REAL LIFE. 

Scene I. — A Day in Borne. — Let us imagine ourselves on some 
bright, clear morning, about eighteen hundred years ago, looking down 
from the summit of the Capitoline Hill upon the ''Mistress of the 
World." As we face the rising sun, we see clustered about us a group 
of hills crowned with a vast assemblage of temples, colonnades, 
palaces, and sacred groves. Densely packed in the valleys between 
are towering tenements, ^ shops with extending booths, and here and 
there a templed forum, amphitheater, or circus. In the valley at our 
feet, between the Via Sacra and the Via Nova, — the only paved roads 
in the whole city fit for the transit of heavy carriages, — is the Forum 
Romanum, so near us that we can watch the storks that stalk along 
the roof of the Temple of Concord, 2 This Forum is the great civil and 
legislative heart of the city. Here are the Regia or palace of the chief 
pontiff, with its two adjoining basilicas ; the Temple of Vesta, on 
whose altar burns the sacred flame ; the Senate House, fronted by the 
Rostra, from which Roman orators address assembled multitudes; 
various temples, including the famous one of Castor and Pollux ; and 



1 Ancient authors frequently mention the extreme height of Roman houses, which 
Augustus finally limited to seventy feet. Cicero says of Rome that " it is suspended 
in the air;" and Aristides, comparing the successive stories to the strata of the 
earth's crust, affirms that if they were laid out on one level they " would cover Italy 
from sea to sea." To economize lateral space, the exterior walls were forbidden to 
exceed a foot and a lialf m thickness. 

^ Storks were encouraged to build in the roof of this temple, as peculiar social 
instincts were attributed to them (see Steele's Popular Zoology, p, 146). 



M1 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 



297 



-^fTff 



.1 u_J_ 



i _m 




many beautiful marble arches, col- 
umns, and statues. At our right is 
the crowded district of the Vela- 
brum, and beyond it, between the 
Palatine and Aventine Hills, is the 
Circus Maximus, from which the 
Appian Way sweeps to the south- 
east, through the Porta Capena and 
under the great Aqua Crabra, a sol- 
idly paved street, many days' jour- 
ney in extent, and lined for miles 
beyond the city walls with mag- 
nificent marble tombs shaded by 
cypress trees. Among the temples on 
the Palatine stands the illustrious 
one sacred to Apollo, along whose 
porticoes hang the trophies of all na- 
tions, and to which is at- 
tached a famous library 



A": 



//' 



ROME IN THE TIME OF AUGUSTUS C^SAB.^, 



298 ROME. 

of Greek and Roman books ; near it is the Quadrata, a square mass 
of masonry, believed to be mysteriously connected with the for- 
tunes of the city, and beneath which certain precious amulets are 
deposited. Interspersed among these public buildings on the Pala- 
tine are many isolated mansions surrounded by beautiful gardens 
fragrant with the odors of roses and violets, in which the Romans 
especially delight. There is no arrangement of streets upon the hills j 
that is a system confined to the crowded Suburra, which adjoins the 
Roman Forum at our front, and lies at the foot of the Quirinal, Viminal, 
and Esquiline Hills. This district, which was once a swampy jungle 
and afterward a fashionable place for residences (Julius Caesar was 
born in the Suburra)^ is now the crowded abode of artificers of all 
kinds, and is the most profligate as well as most densely populated 
part of Rome. 

Turning about and facing the west, we see, toward the north, the 
Campus Martins, devoted from the earliest period to military exercises 
and the sports of running, leaping, and bathing. On this side of the 
open meadows stand some of the principal temples, the great Flaminian 
Circus, and the theaters of Pompeius and Marcellus, with their groves, 
porticoes, and halls. Precisely in the center of the plain rises the 
Pantheon of Agrippa, and further on we see the Amphitheater of 
Taurus, 1 and the Mausoleum of Augustus. At our front, beyond the 
curving, southward-flowing Tiber, is a succession of terraces, Tipon 
whose heights are many handsome residences. This quarter, the 
Janiculum, is noted for its salubrity, and here are the Gardens of 
Caesar, and the Naumachia (a basin for exhibiting naval engagements) 
of Augustus, fed by a special aqueduct, and surrounded by walks and 
groves. Glancing down the river, we see the great wharf called the 
Emporium, with its immense store-houses, in which grain, spices, 
candles, paper, and other commodities are stored ; and just beyond it, 
the Marmorata, a special dock for landing building-stone and foreign 
marbles. It is yet early morning, and the streets of Rome are mainly 
filled with clients and their slaves hurrying to the atria (p. 303) of their 
wealthy patrons to receive the customary morning dole. 2 Here and 

1 The whole of this northern district comprehends the chief part of modern 
Rome, and is now thronged with houses. 

2 In early times the clients were Invited to feast with their patron in the atrium 
of Ills mansion, but in later days It became customary, instead, for stewards to dis- 
tribute small sums of money or an allowance of food, which the slaves of the clients 
carried away in baskets or in small portable ovens, to keep the cooked meats hot. 

" Wedged in thick ranks before the donor's gates, 
A phalanx firm of chairs and litters waits. 
Once, plain and open was the feast, 
And every client was a bidden guest; 
Now, at the gate a paltry largess lies, 
And eager hands and tongues dispute the -gvizQ."— Juvenal. 




TUB 



PLAN OF ANCIENT ROME, 

SHOWING THE DIVISION INTO 
3SI-V R,EGI01SrS OF uA.XTa-XJSTXTS 

AND THE POSITION OF THE PRINCIPAL BUILDINGS. 



I. PORTA CAPENA. 

1. Porta Capena. 

2. Yalley of Egeria. 

3. Tomb of Scipio. 
II. C^LIMONTIUM. 

4. Temple of Divus Claudius 

5. Arch of Constantine. 
■ III. TSIS ET SERAPIS. 

6. Colosseum. 

7. Baths of Titus. 

8. Baths of Trajan. 

IV. VIA Sacra. 

9. Forum of Vespasian. 

10. Basilica of Constantine. 
V. ESQUILINA CUM VIMI 

NALI. 

11. Temple of Juno. 
VI. ALTA SEMITA. 

12. Baths of Diocletian. 

13. Temple of Flora. 

14. Temple of Quirinus. 

15. Baths of Constantine. 

VII. Via lata. 

16. Archof Aurehus. 

17. Archof Claudius. 



18. 
19. 
20. 
21. 

VIII. 

22. 
23. 
24. 
25. 
26. 
27. 
28. 
29. 
30. 
31. 
32. 
33. 
34. 
35. 

IX. 
36. 
37. 



39. 



Amphitheater of Taurus, 
Column of Antoninus. 
Camp of Agrippa. 
TemjJe of Isis and Se- 
rapis. 
FORUM EOMANUM. 
Capitoline Hill 
Temple of JupiterTonans 
Arx. 

Golden Milestone. 
Eoman Forum. 
Temple of Vesta. 
Via Sacra. 
Lupercal. 
Tarpeian Eock. 
Arch of Severus. 
Curia (Senate House). 
Forum of Augustus. 
BasiUca Ulpia. 
Temple of Janus. 

CIRCUS Flaminius. 
Theater of Marcellus. 
Port, of Octavius and 

Phihppa. 
Circus Flaminius. 
Temple of Apollo. 



40. Temple of Bellona. 

41. Septa Julia. 

42. Diribitorium. 

43. Baths of Agrippa. 

44. Port, of Pompey. 

45. Theater of Pompey. 

46. Pantheon. 

47. Baths of Nero. 

48. Eace-course. 

49. Mausoleum of Augustus. 
X. PALATIUM, 

50. Palace of Nero. 

51. Palace of Augrustus. 

XI. CIRCUS MAXIMUS. 

52. Yelabrum. 

53. Forum OUtorium. 

54. Forum Boarium. 

55. Circus Maximus. 

XII. PISCINA PUBLIC A. 

56. Baths of Antoninus. 

XIII. AVENTINUS. 

57. Balnea Surae. 

58. Emporium. 

XIV. Trans tiberim. 

59. Temple of .fflsculapius. 



300 ROME. 

there a teacher hastens to his school, and in the Suourra the workers 
in metal and in leather, the clothiers and perfume sellers, the book- 
dealers, the general retailers, and the jobbers of all sorts, are already 
beginning their daily routine. We miss the carts laden with mer- 
chandise which so obstruct our modern city streets ; they are forbidden 
by law to appear within the walls during ten hours between sunrise 
and sunset. But, as the city wakes to life, long trains of builders' 
wagons, weighted with huge blocks of stone or logs of timber, bar 
the road, and mules, with country produce piled in baskets suspended 
on either side, urge their way along the constantly increasing crowd. 
Here is a mule with a dead boar thrown across its back, the proud hun- 
ter stalking in front, with a strong force of retainers to carry his spears 
and nets. There comes a load drawn by oxen, upon whose horns a 
wisp of hay is tied ; it is a sign that they are vicious, and passers-by 
must be on guard. Now a passage is cleared for some dignified patri- 
cian, who, wrapped in his toga, reclining in his luxurious litter, and 
borne on the broad shoulders of six stalwart slaves, makes his way to 
the Forum attended by a train of clients and retainers. In his rear, 
stepping from stone to stone ^ across the slippery street wet by the 
recent rains, we spy some popular personage on foot, whose advance 
is constantly retarded by his demonstrative acquaintances, who throng 
about him, seize his hand, and cover his lips with kisses. 2 

The open cook-shops swarm with slaves who hover over steaming 
kettles, preparing breakfast for their wonted customers ; and the tables 
of the vintners, reaching far out upon the wayside, are covered with 
bottles, protected from passing pilferers by chains. The restaurants 
are hung with festoons of greens and flowers ; the image of a goat, 3 
carved on a wooden tablet, betokens a milk depot ; five hams, ranged 

1 In Pompeii, tlie sidewalks are elevated a foot or more above the street level, 
and protected by curb-stones. Remains of tlie stucco or the coarse brick- work mosaic 
•which covered them are still seen. In many places the streets are so narrow that 
they may be crossed at one stride ; where they are wider, a raised stepping-stone, 
and sometimes two or three, have been placed in the center of tlie crossing. Though 
these stones were in the middle of the carriage-way, the wheels of the Mga, or two- 
horsed chariot, could roll in the spaces between, while the loosely harnessed horses 
might step over them or pass by the side. Among the suggestive objects in tlie 
exhumed city are the hollows worn in these stepping-stones by feet which were for- 
ever stilled more than eighteen hundred years ago. 

2 " At every meeting in the street a person was exposed to a number of kisses, 
not only from near acquaintance, but from every one who desired to show his attach- 
ment, among whom there were often mouths not so clean as they migl)t be. Tiberius, 
who wished himself not to be humbled by this custom, issued an edict against it, 
but it does not a])pear to have done much good. In winter only it was considered 
improper to annoy another with one's cold li-ps."— Becker's Qallus. 

3 A goat driven about from door to door, to be milked for customers, is a common 
Bight in Rome to-day, where children come out with gill or half -pint cups to get their 
morning ration. 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 301 

in a row, proclaim a provision store ; and a mill, driven by a mule, 
advertises a miller's and baker's shop, both in one. About the street 
corners are groups of loungers collected for their morning gossip, 
while gymnasts and gladiators, clowns, conjurers, snake-charmers, and 
a crowd of strolling swine, — who roam at will about the imperial city, — 
help to obstruct the narrow, tortuous highways. The professional 
street-beggars are out in force ; squatting upon little squares of mat- 
ting, they piteously implore a dole, or, feigning epilepsy, fall at the 
feet of some rich passer-by. Strangers, too, are here ; men of foreign 
costume and bearing come from afar to see the wonders of the world- 
conquering city, and, as they gaze distractedly about, dazed by the din 
of rumbling wagons, shouting drivers, shrill-voiced hucksters, braying 
asses, and surging multitudes, suddenly there comes a lull. The 
slaves, whose task it is to watch the sun-dials and report the expiration 
of each hour, have announced that the sun has passed the mid-day line 
upon the pavement. Soon all tumult ceases, and for one hour the city 
is wrapped in silence. 

The luxurious siesta over, Kome awakes to new enjoyment. Now 
come the pleasures and excitement of the circus and the theater, or 
the sports upon the Campus Martins, whither the young fashionables 
repair in crowds, to swim, run, ride, or throw the javelin, watched 
by an admiring assembly of seniors and women, who, clustered in 
porticoes, are sheltered from the burning sun. Then follows the luxury 
of the warm and vapor baths, with perfuming and anointing, and every 
refinement of physical refreshment as a preparation for the coming 
ccena or dinner (p. 306). But wherever one may seek enjoyment for 
the early evening, it is well to be housed before night comes on, for 
the streets of Eome swarm with nocturnal highwaymen, marauders, 
and high-blooded rowdies, who set the police at open defiance, and 
keep whole districts in terror. There are other dangers, too, for night 
is the time chosen by the careful housewife to dump the slops and 
dedris from her upper windows into the open drain of the street below. 
Fires, also, are frequent, and, though the night-watch is provided with 
hatchets and buckets to resist its progress, a conflagration, once started 
in the crowded Suburra or Velabrum, spreads with fearful rapidity, 
and will soon render hundreds of families homeless.l Meanwhile 
the carts, shut out by law during the daytime, crowd and jostle one 
another in the eagerness of their noisy drivers to finish their duties 

1 The tenements of the lower classes in Rome were so crowded that often whole 
families were huddled together in one small room. The different stories were reached 
by stairways placed on tlie outside of the buildings.— There were no fire-insurance 
companies, but the sufferers were munificently recompensed by generous citizens, 
their loss being not only made good in money, but followed by presents of books, 
pictures, statues, and choice mosaics, from their zealous friends. Martial insinuates 
that on this account parties were sometimes tempted to fire their own premiaes. 



302 



ROME. 



and be at liberty for the night, while here and there groups of smok- 
ing flambeaux mark the well-armed trains of the patricians on their 
return from evening banquets. As the night advances, the sights and 
sounds gradually fade and die away, till in the first hours of the new 
day the glimmering lantern of the last wandering pedestrian has dis- 
appeared, and the great city lies under the stars asleep. 

Scene II. — A Roman HomeA — We will not visit one of the tall 
lodging-houses which crowd the Suburra, though in passing we may 
glance at the plain, bare outside wall, with its few small windows 2 
placed in the upper stories and graced with pots of flowers ; and at 
the outside stairs by which the inmates mount to those dizzy heights, 
and under which the midnight robber and assassin often lurk. Some- 
times we see a gabled front or end with a sloping roof, or feel the shade 
of projecting balconies which stretch far over the narrow street. 
On many a flat roof, paved with stucco, stone, or metal, and covered 
with earth, grow fragrant shrubs and flowers. Coming into more aristo- 
cratic neighborhoods, we yet see little domestic architecture to attract 
us. It is only when a spacious vestibule, adorned 
with statues and mosaic pillars, lies open to the 
street, that we have any intimation of the luxury 
within a Roman dwelling. If, entering such a 
vestibule, we rap with the bronze knocker, the 
unfastened folding-doors are pushed aside by 
the waiting janitor (who first peeps at us through 
the large open spaces in the door-posts), 3 and we 
find ourselves in the little ostium or entrance 
hall leading to the atrium. Here we are greeted, 
not only by the "salve" (welcome) on the mosaic 
pavement, but by the same cheerful word chat- 
tered by a trained parrot hanging above the 
door. We linger to notice the curiously carved door-posts, inlaid with 
tortoise-shell, and the door itself, which, instead of hinges, is provided 




A ROMAN LAMP, 



1 No traces of ancient private dwellings exist In Rome, except in the ruins of the 
Palace of the Caesars on the Palatine, where the so-called " House of Livia" (wife of 
Augustus), remains tolerably perfect. It is similar in dimensions and arrangement to 
the best Porapeian dwellings, though far superior in paintings and decorations. The 
" House of Pansa " in Pompeii, the plan of which is described in the text, is consid- 
ered a good representative example of a wealthy Roman's home. 

2 Panes of glass have been found in Pompeii, though it was more usual to close 
the window-holes with movable wooden shutters, clay tablets, talc, or nets. 

3 In ancient times the janitor, accompanied by a dog, was confined to his proper 
station by a chain. As it was not customary to keep the door locked, such a protec- 
tion was necessary. In the " House of the Tragic Poet," exhumed at Pompeii, a 
fierce black and white dog is depicted in the mosaic pavement, and underneath it is 
the inscription, " Cave Canem " (Beware of the Dog). 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 303 

with wedge-shaped pins, fitting into sockets or rings, and then we pass 
into the atrium, the room about which cluster the most sacred memo- 
ries of Roman domestic life. Here in ancient times all the simple 
meals were taken beside the hearth on which they were prepared, and 
by which the sacrifices were daily offered up to the beloved Lares and 
Penates. 1 Here was welcomed the master's chosen bride, and here, a 
happy matron, 2 she afterward sat enthroned in the midst of her in- 
dustrious maids, spinning and weaving the household garments. From 
their niches upon these walls, by the side of glistening weapons captured 
in many a bloody contest, the waxen masks of honored ancestors have 
looked down for generations, watching the bodies of the family de- 
scendants, as one by one they have lain in state upon the funeral bier. 
— But increase of luxury has banished the stewing-pans, the busy 
looms, and the hospitable table to other apartments in the growing 
house. The Lares and Penates have left their primitive little closets by 
the atrium cooking-hearth for a larger and separate sacrarium, and 
spacious kitchens now send forth savory odors from turbot, pheasant, 
wild boar, and sausages, to be served up in summer or winter trielin- 
iums by a host of well-trained slaves. 3 The household dead are still 
laid here, but the waxen masks of olden times are gradually giving 
place to brazen shield-shaped plates on which are dimly imaged 

1 At every meal the first act was to cast a portion of each article of food into the 
fire that burned upon the hearth, in honor of the household gods. 

2 The Roman matron, unlike the Greek, enjoyed great freedom of action, both 
within and without her house, and was always treated with atteotion and respect. 

3 The Romans were fond of amazing their guests with costly dainties, such as 
nightingales, peacocks, and the tongues and brains of flamingoes. Caligula dissolved 
pearls in powerful acids, in imitation of Cleopatia, aud spent |400,000 on a single 
repast. A dramatic friend of Cicero paid over $4,000 for a dish of singing birds ; and 
one famous epicure, after having exhausted the sum of four million dollars in his 
good living, poisoned himself because he had not quite half a million left ! Fish was 
a favorite food, and the mansions of the rich were fitted up with fish-ponds {piscince) 
for the culture of rare varieties, which were sometimes caught and cooked on silver 
gridirons before invited guests, who enjoyed the changing colors of the slowly dying 
fish, and the tempting odor of the coming treat. Turbots, mackerels, eels, and oys- 
ters were popular delicacies, and a fine mullet brought sometimes as much as $240. 
In game the fatted hare and the wild boar, served whole, were ranked first. Pork, as 
in Greece, was the favorite meat, beef and mutton being regarded with little favor. 
Great display was made in serving, and Juvenal ridicules the airs of the professional 
carver of his time, who, he says,— 

" Skips like a harlequin from place to place, 
And waves his knife with pantomimic grace — 
For different gestures by our curious men 
Are used for different dishes, hare and hen." 

In vegetables the Romans had lettuce, cabbage, turnips, and asparagus. Mush- 
rooms were highly prized. The poorer classes lived on cheap fish, boiled chick-peas^ 
beans, lentils, barley bread, and puis or grueL 



304 



ROME. 



features, or to "bronze and marble "busts. 1 The little aperture in the 
center of the ceiling, which served the double purpose of escape for 
smoke and the admission of sunlight, has been enlarged, and is sup- 
ported by costly marble pillars, alternating with statues ; directly un- 
derneath it, the open cistern reflects each passing cloud, and mirrors 
the now-unused altar, which, for tradition's sake, is still left standing 
by its side. When the rain, wind, or heat becomes severe, a tapestry 
curtain, hung horizontally, is drawn over the aperture, and sometimes 
a pretty fountain, surrounded by ' flowering plants, embellishes the 
pool of water. Tapestries, sliding by rings on bars, conceal or open 
to view the apartments which adjoin the atrium. As we stand at the 
entrance-door of this spacious room, 2 with the curtains all drawn aside, 




THE HOUSE OF PANSA (VIEW FROM THE ENTEANCE-DOOR OF THE ATRIUM). 

we look down a long and beautiful vista ; past the central fountain 
and altar ; through the open tablinum, paved with marbles and devoted 
to the master's use ; into the peristyle, a handsome open court sur- 
rounded by pillared arcades, paved with mosaics, and beautified, like 
the atrium, with central fountain and flowers ; and still on, through 
the large banqueting hall, or family state-room {(ecus), beyond the 
transverse corridor, and into the garden which stretches across the 
rear of the mansion. If we stop to glance into the library which ad- 
joins the tablinum, we shall find its walls lined with cupboards stored 



1 Pliny speaks of the craving for portrait statues, wliicli inflnced obscnre persons, 
suddenly grown rich, to buy a fictitious ancestry, there being ready antiquarians 
then, as now, who made it a business to furnish satisfactory pedigrees. 

2 The atrium in the House of Pansa was nearly fifty feet long, and over thirty 
wide. As this was only a moderate-sized liouse in a provincial town, it is reasonable 
to suppose that the city houses of the rich were much more spacious. 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 305 

with pareliment rolls and adorned with busts and pictures of illustrious 
men, crowned by the presiding statues of Minerva and the Muses. 
(n general furniture, we notice beautiful tripod-stands holding grace- 
ful vases, chairs after Greek patterns, and lecti i on which to recline 
when reading or writing. Occasionally there is a small wall-mirror, 
made of polished metal, and the walls themselves are brilliantly 
painted in panels, bearing graceful floating figures and scenes of 
mythological design. The floors are paved with bricks, marbles, or 
mosaics, and the rooms are warmed or cooled by pipes through which 
flows hot or cold water. In extreme weather there are portable 
stoves. There is a profusion of quaintly shaped bronze and even 
golden lamps, whose simple oil-fed wicks give forth at night a 
feeble glimmer, 2 As we pass through the fauces into the peristyle, 
a serpent slowly uncoils itself from its nest in one of the alas, which 
has been made the household sanctuary, 3 and glides toward the 
triclinium in search of a crumb from the mid-day meal. 

The large triclinium at the right of the peristyle is furnished with 
elegantly inlaid sofas, which form three sides of a square about 
a costly cedar or citrus- wood table. 4: At banquets the sofas are 

1 A lectus was neither beil nor sofa, Ijut a simple frame with a low ledge at one 
end, and strung with girth on which a mattress and coverings were laid. Lecti were 
made of brass, or of cedar inlaid with ivory, tortoise-shell, and precious metals, and 
were provided with ivory, gold, or silver feet. Writing-desks with stools were un- 
known ; the Roman reclined on the lectus when he wrote, resting his tablet upon 
his knee. 

2 The Romans were in the habit of making New- Year's gifts, such as dried figs, 
dates, and honeycomb, as emblems of sweetness, or a little piece of money as a hope 
for good luck. But the favorite gift was a lamp, and great genius was displayed in 
the variety of elegant designs which were invented in search of the novel and unique, 

3 Serpents were the emblems of the Lares, and were not only figured upon the 
altars, but, to insure family piosperity, a certain kind was kept as pets in the 
houses, where they nestled about the altars and came out like dogs or cats to be 
noticed by visitors, and to beg for something to eat. These sacred reptiles, which 
were of considerable size, but harmless except to rats and mice, bore such a charmed 
life that their numbers became an intolerable nuisance. Pliny intimates that many 
of the fires in Rome were kindled purposely to destroy their eggs. 

4 The citrus-wood tables, so prized among the Romans, cost from $40,000 to 
$50,000 apiece. Seneca is said to liave owned five hundred citrus-wood tables. 
Vases of murrha— a substance identified by modern scientists with glass, Chinese 
porcelain, agate, and fluor-spar— were fashionable, and fabulous sums were paid 
for them. An ex-consul under Nero had a murrha wine-ladle wliich cost him 
$300,000, and which on his deatli-bed he deliberately dashed to pieces, to prevent 
its falling into the hands of the grasping tyrant. Bronze and marble statues were 
abundant in the houses and gardens of the rich, and cost fiom $150 for the work 
of an ordinary sculptor, to $30,000 for a genuine Phidias, Scopas, or Praxiteles. To 
gratify such expensive tastes, large fortunes were necessary, and tlie Romans— in 
early times averse to anything but arms and agriculture— developed shrewd, sharp 
business qualities. They roamed over foreign countries in search of speculations, 
and turned out swarms of bankers and merchants, who amassed enormous sums to 



306 



ROME. 



decked with white hangings embroidered with gold, and the soft wool- 
stuffed pillows upon which the guests recline are covered with gor- 
geous purple. Here, after his daily warm and vapor bath, the per- 
fumed and enervated Roman gathers a few friends — in number not 
more than the Muses nor less than the Graces — for the evening supper 
{ccena). The courses follow one another as at a Grecian banquet. 
Slaves! relieve the master and his guests from the most trifling effort, 




PLAN OF THE HOUSE OF PANSA. 

(v) The Vestibulum, or hall; (1) The Ostium; (2) The Atrium, off which are six 
cuhieula or sleeping-rooms; (3) Tlie iTnpluvium,, before which stands the 
pedestal or altar of the household gods; (4) The Tablinum,, or chief room; 
(5) The Pinacotheca, or library and picture galleiy; (6) The Fauces, or corri- 
dor; (7) The Peristy Hum, or court, witli (8) its central fountain; (9) Theseus, 
or state-room; (10) The Triclinium,; (11) The kitchen; (r2) Tlie transverse 
corridor, with garden beyond; and (Vi) The Lararium, a receptacle for the 
more favorite gods, and for statues of illustrious peisonages. 

carving each person's food or breaking it into fragments which he 
can raise to his mouth with his fingers, — forks being unknown, — and 
pouring water on his hands at every remove. The strictest etiquette 
prevails ; long-time usages and traditions are followed ; libations are 
offered to the protecting gods ; spirited conversation, which is un- 
dignified and Greekish, is banished ; and only solemn or caustic 
aphorisms on life and manners are heard. ^'People at supper," 
says Varro, ''should be neither mute nor loquacious: eloquence is 
for the forum; silence for the bed-chamber." On high days, rules 
are banished; the host becomes the "Father of the supper," convivial 
excesses grow coarse and absurd, and all the follies and vices of the 
Greek symposium are exaggerated. 

be spent on fashionable whims (see " Business Life in Ancient Rome," Harper's 
Half- hour Series). 

1 There were slaves for every species of service in a Roman household, and their 
number and versatility of handicraft remind one of the retinue of an Egyptian lord. 
Even the defective memory or limited talent of an indolent or over-taxed Roman 
was supplemented by a slave at his side, whose business it was to recall forgotten 
incidents and duties, to tell him the names of the persons he met, or to suggest ap- 
propriate literary allusions in his conversation. 



THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 307 

Scene III. — A Triumphal Procession. — Rome is in her holiday 
attire. Streets and squares are festively adorned, and incense burns 
on the altars of the open temples. From steps and stands, improvised 
along the streets for the eager crowd, grow loud and louder shouts of 
' * Jo triumphe ! " for the procession has started from the triumphal gate 
on its way through the city up to the Capitol. First come the lictors, 
opening a passage for the senate, the city magistrates, and important 
citizens. Pipers and flute-players follow. Then appear the spoils and 
"booty ; art-treasures, gold and silver coins, valuable plate, products of 
the conquered soil, armor, standards, models of captured cities and 
ships, pictures of battles, tablets inscribed with the victor's deeds, and 
statues personifying the towns and rivers of the newly subjected 
land, — all carried by crowned soldiers on the points of long lances 
or on portable stands. Chained kings, princes, and nobles, doomed to 
the Mamertine Prison, walk sullenly behind their lost treasures. In 
their wake are the sacrificial oxen with gilt horns, accompanied by 
priests ; and then — preceded by singers, musicians, and jesters, the cen- 
tral object of all this grand parade — the victorious general.! Clad 
in a tunic borrowed from the statue of the Capitoline Jupiter, with the 
eagle-topped ivory scepter in his hand and the triumphal crown held 
above his head, the conqueror proudly stands in his four-horse chariot, 
followed by his equally proud, victorious army. Through the Flamin- 
ian Circus, along the crowded Velabrum and the Circus Maximus, 
by the Via Sacra and the Forum, surges the vast procession up to the 
majestic Capitol. Here the triumphator lays his golden crown in the 
lap of Jupiter, and makes the imposing sacrifice. A feast of unusual 
sumptuousness ends the eventful day. 

Scene IV. — The Last of a Roman Emperor. — *'It is the Roman 
habit to consecrate the emperors who leave heirs. The mortal re- 
mains are buried, according to custom, in a splendid manner; but the 
wax image of the emperor is placed on an ivory bed, covered with gold- 
embroidered carpets, in front of the palace. The expression of the 
face is that of one dangerously ill. To the left side of the bed stand, 
during a greater part of the day, the members of the senate ; to the 
right, the ladies entitled by birth or marriage to appear at court, in the 
usual simple white mourning-dresses without gold ornaments or neck- 
laces. This ceremony lasts seven days, during which time the imperial 
physicians daily approach the bed as if to examine the patient, who, 
of course, is declining rapidly. At last they declare the emperor dead. 
The bier is now transported by the highest born knights and the 

1 Only dictators, consuls, praetors, and occasionally legates, were permitted the 
triumphal entrance. Sometimes the train of spoils and captives was sc great that 
two, three, and even four days were required for the parade. In later times the 
triumphal procession was exclusively reserved for the emperor. 



308 ROME. 

younger senators through the Via Sacra to the old Forum, and there 
deposited on a scaffolding built in the manner of a terrace. On one 
side stand young patricians, on the other noble ladies, intoning hymns 
and pgeans in honor of the deceased to a solemn, sad tune ; after which 
the bier is taken up again, and carried to the Campus Martins. A 
wooden structure in the form of a house has been erected on large 
blocks of wood on a square base ; the inside has been filled with dry 
sticks; the outside is adorned with gold-embroidered carpets, ivory 
statues, and various sculptures. The bottom story, a little lower than 
the second, shows the same form and ornamentation as this ; it has 
open doors and windows ; above these two stories rise others, growing 
narrow toward the top, like a pyramid. The whole structure might be 
compared to the lighthouses erected in harbors. The bier is placed 
in the second story i spices, incense, odoriferous fruits and herbs being 
heaped round it. After the whole room has been filled with incense, 
the knights move in procession round the entire structure, and per- 
form some military evolutions ; they are followed by chariots filled 
with persons wearing masks and clad in purple robes, who represent 
historic characters, such as celebrated generals and kings. After these 
ceremonies are over, the heir to the throne throws a torch into the 
house, into which, at the same time, flames are dashed from all sides, 
which, fed by the combustible materials and the incense, soon begin 
to devour the building. At this juncture an eagle rises into the air 
from the highest story as from a lofty battlement, and carries, accord- 
ing to the idea of the Romans, the soul of the dead emperor to heaven ^ 
from that moment he partakes of the honors of the gods." — Herodian. 



4. SUMMARY. 

1. Political History. — Rome began as a single city. The growth 
of her power was slow but steady. She became head, first, of 
the neighboring settlements ; second, of Latium ; third, of Italy ; and, 
fourth, of the lands around the Mediterranean. In her early historyj 
there was a fabulous period during which she was ruled by kings. 
The last of the seven monarchs belonged to a foreign dynasty, and 
upon his expulsion a republic was established. Two centuries of con- 
flict ensued between the patricians and the plebs ; but the latter, going 
ofttimes to Mount Sacer, gained their end and established a democracy. 

Meanwhile, wars with powerful neighbors and with the awe-in- 
spiring Gauls had developed the Roman character in all its sternness, 
integrity, and patriotism. Rome next came in contact with Pyrrhus, 
and learned how to fortify her military camps ; then with Carthage, 
and she found out the value of a navy. An apt pupil, she gained the 



SUMMARY. 309 

mastery of the sea, invaded Africa, and in the end razed Carthage to 
the ground. Turning to the west, she secured Spain — the silver- 
producing country of that age — and Gaul, whose fiery sons filled the 
depleted ranks of her legions. At the east she intrigued where she 
could, and fought where she must, and by disorganizing states made 
them first her dependencies, and then her provinces. Greece, Macedon, 
Asia Minor, Syria, Egypt, Babylon, were but stepping-stones in her 
progress until Parthia alone remained to bar her advance to the Indus 
and the ocean. 

But within her gates the struggle between the rich and the poor 
still went on. Crowds of slaves — captives of her many wars — 
thronged her streets, kept her shops, waited in her homes, tilled her 
land, and tended her flocks. The plebeians, shut out from honest 
toil, struggled for the patrician's dole. The civil wars of Sulla and 
Marius drenched her pavements with the blood of her citizens. The 
triumphs of Caesar shed a gleam of glory over the fading republic, but 
the mis-aimed daggers of Brutus and Cassius that slew the dictator 
struck at the heart of liberty as well. 

Augustus brought in the empire and an era of peace. Now the 
army gained control of the state. Weak and wicked emperors, the 
luxury of wealth, the influx of oriental profligacy, the growth of 
atheism, and the greed of conquest, undermined the fabric of Roman 
greatness. The inhabitants of the provinces were made Romans, and, 
Rome itself being lost in the empire it had created, other cities became 
the seats of government. Amid the ruins of the decaying monarchy 
a new religion supplanted the old, and finally Teutonic hordes from 
the north overwhelmed the city that for centuries their own soldiers 
had alone upheld. 

2. Civilization. — As in Greece the four ancient Attic tribes were 
subdivided into phratries, gentes, and hearths, so in Rome the three 
original patrician tribes branched into curiae, gentes, and families, the 
paterfamilias owning all the property, and holding the life of his 
children at will. 

The civil magistrates comprised consuls, quaestors, aediles, and 
praetors. 

The army was organized in legions, cohorts, companies, and cen- 
turies, with four classes of foot-soldiers, who fought with the pilum 
and the javelin, protected themselves with heavy breastplates, and 
" carried on sieges by the aid of ballistas, battering-rams, catapults, and 
movable towers. In later times the ranks were filled by foreigners 
and mercenaries. 

Roman literature, child of the Grecian, is rich with memorable 
names. Ushered in by Livius Andronieus, a Greek slave, it grew with 
Nsevius, Ennius, Plautus, Terence, Cato, and Lucilius. The learned 



310 ROME. 

Varro, the florid Cicero, the graceful Virgil, the genial Horace, the 
eloquent Livy, and the polished Sallust, ennobled the last century be- 
fore Christ. The next hundred years produced the studious Pliny the 
Elder, the two inseparable friends Pliny the Younger and Tacitus, 
the sarcastic Juvenal, and the wise Seneca. 

The monuments of the Romans comprise splendid aqueducts, tri- 
umphal arches, military roads, bridges, harbors, and tombs. Their 
magnificent palaces and luxurious thermae were fitted up with reckless 
extravagance and dazzling display. All the spoils of conquered 
nations enriched their capital, and all the foreign arts and inventions 
were impressed into their service. 

The proud, dignified, ambitious Roman had no love or tenderness 
for aught but his national supremacy. Seldom indulging in sentiment 
toward family or kindred, he recognized no law of humanity toward 
his slaves. His religion was a commercial bargain with the gods, in 
which each was at liberty to outwit the other. His worship was mostly 
confined to the public ceremonies at the shrine of Vesta, and the con- 
stant household offerings to the Lares and Penates. His 'public games 
were a degraded imitation of the Grecian, and he took his chief de- 
light in bloody gladiatorial shows and wild-beast fights. 

A race of borrowers, the Romans assimilated into their nationality 
most of the excellences as well as many of the vices of other peoples, 
for centuries stamping the whole civilized world with their character, 
and dominating it by their successes. "As to Rome all ancient history 
converges, so from Rome all modern history begins." 

Finally, as a central point in the history of all time, in the midst of 
the brilliancy of the Augustan age, while Cicero, Sallust, Virgil, and 
Horace were fresh in the memory of their still living friends, with 
Seneca in his childhood and Livy in his prime, the empire at its best, 
and Rome radiant in its growing transformation from brick to marble 
under the guiding rule of the great Augustus Ca3sar, there was born 
in an obscure Roman province the humble Babe whose name far out- 
ranks all these, and from whose nativity are dated all the centuries 
which have succeeded. 



READING REFERENCES. 

Merivdle's History of the Romans.— ITine's History of Rome, and Early Rome.— 
History Primers i Rome, and Roman Antiquities, edited by Green.- -Arnold's His- 
tory of Rome.—Niebufir's History of Rome.— Smith's smaller History of Rome.— 
Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.— Guhl and Koner's Life of the 
Greeks and Romans.— KnighVs Social Life of the Romans. Plutarch's Lives.— Mil- 
man's History of Christianity.— Mommsen's History of Rome.—Eroude's Life of Ccesar. 
— Becker's Charicles, and Gallus.—Macaulay's Lays of Ancient Rome.—S7iakspere's 



CHRONOLOGY. 



311 



Julius Ccesar, Coriolanus, and Antony and Cleopatra.— Forsyih^s Life of Cicero.— 
Napoleon's (III.) Life of Coesar.—Canina's Edifices of Ancient Rome.—Fergussoii's 
History of Architecture.— Bulwer's Last Days of Pompeii, and Rienzi the Last of 
the Tribunes.— Michelet's Eoman Bepublic—Heeren's Historical Researches.— Putz's 
Hand-book of Ancient History.— Hare's Walks in Rome.—Kingsley's Hypatia.— Lord's 
Old Roman World.— ^tann's Ancient and Mediceval Republics.— Lawrence's Primer 
of Roman Literature.— Collins' s Ancient Classics for English Readers (a series 
giving striking passages from the Greek and Roman classics, with excellent explana- 
tory notes, lives of the authors, etc.).— Dyer's Pompeii.— Herbermann's Business Life in 
Ancient Rome.— Lanciani's Ancient Rome in the Light of Recent Discoveries. 



CHRONOLOGY. 



B.C. 

Rome founded 753 

Republic establislied 509 

The Decemvirs 451 

Rome taken by Gauls 390 

First Samnite War 343-341 

Great Latin War. 340-338 

Second Samnite War 326-304 

Third " " 298-290 

Wars with Pyrrhus 280-276 

First Punic War 264-241 

Second " " 218-201 

Battle of the Trebia 218 

" " Lake Trasimenus 217 

" " Cannae 216 

Siege of Capua 214-211 

Battle of the Metaurus 207 

" " Zama 202 

Second Macedonian War 200-197 

Battle of Magnesia 190 

Death of Hannibal and Scipio Afri- 

cauus 183 

Third Macedonian War 171-168 

Battle of Pydna 168 

Third Punic War 149-146 

Fall of Carthage and Corinth 146 

Death of Tiberius Gracchus 133 

Jugurthine War 111-104 

Marius defeated Teutones at Aquae 

Sextiae (Aix) 102 

Marius defeated Cimbri 101 

Social War 90-88 

First Mithridatic War 88-84 

Massacre by Marius 87 

Second Mithridatic War 83-81 

Sulla's Proscriptions 83 

Third Mithridatic War 74-63 

War of Spartacus 73-71 

Mediterranean Pirates 67 

Conspiracy of Catiline 63 



B. C. 

First Triumvirate 60 

Caesar in Gaul 58-49 

" invades Britain 55 

" crosses the Rubicon 49 

Battle of Pharsalia— death of Pom- 

pey 48 

Suicide of Cato 46 

Caesar assassinated 44 

Second Triumvirate, death of Cicero 43 
Battle of Philippi, suicide of Brutus 

and Cassius 42 

Battle of Actium... 31 

Augustus 31 

A. D. 

Tiberius 14 

Caligula 37 

Claudius 41 

Nero 54 

Galba 68 

Otho ;.. 69 

Vitellius 69 

Vespasian 69 

Titus 79 

Domitian 81 

Nerva 96 

Trajan 98 

Hadrian 117 

Antoninus Pius ■. 138 

M. Aurelius Antoninus 161-180 

L. Verus 161-169 

Commodus 180 

Pertinax 193 

Didius Julianus - 193 

Septimius Severus 193 

Caracallus 211-217 

Geta 211-212 

Macrinus 217 

Elagabalus (the sun-priest) 218 

Alexander Severus 222 



312 



ROME. 



238 



A.D. 

Maximinus 235 

Gordian I. ) 

Gordianll. S ^'^^ 

Pupienus Maximus ) 

Balbinus 5 

Gordian III 238-244 

Philip tlie Arabian 244 

Decius 249 

Gallus 251 

jEmilian 253 

Valerian 253 

Gallienus 260 

Claudius II 268 

Aurelian 270 

Tacitus 275 

Florian 276 

Probus 276 

Carus 282 

Carinus and Numerian 283 

Diocletian, with Maximian 284 

Constantius, with Galerius 305 

Constantine I. (the Great), with Ga- 
lerius, Severua, and Maxentius 306 



A. D. 

Constantine, with Licinius 307 

Constantine, with Maximinus 308 

Constantine, alone 323 

Constantine II., Constantius II., 

Constans 1 337 

Julian the Apostate 361 

Jovian 363 

Valentinian 1 364 

Gratian and Valentinian II 375 

Valentinian II 383 

Theodosius (East and West) 392 

Honorius 395 

Theodosius II. ( East and West) 423 

Valentinian III 425 

Petronius Maximus 455 

Avitus 455 

Majorian 457 

Libius Severus 461 

Anthemius 467 

Olybrius 472 

Glycerins 473 

Julius Nepos 474 

Romulus Augustulus 475-476 




TOMBS ALONG THE APPIAN WAY. 



APPENDIX. 



rpHE SEVEN WONDERS OF THE WORLD, as reckoned by tlie 
J- Greeks, were The Egyptian Pyramids ; The Temple, Walls, and 
Hanging Gardens of Babylon ; The Greek Statue of Jupiter at Olympia ; 
The Temple of Diana at Ephesus ; The Mausoleum at Halicarnassus ; 
The Pharos at Alexandria ; and The Colossus of Rhodes. All but the 
last three have already been described. 

The Mausoleum was a monument erected by Artemisia, Queeii of 
Caria (b. c. 353), to her deceased husband Mausolus. It was built of 
the most precious marbles, and decorated in the highest style of Grecian 
art. Its cost was so immense that the philosopher Anaxagoras on 
seeing it exclaimed, "How much money is changed into stone ! " Not 
a vestige of it now remains. 

The Pharos was a lighthouse built by the first two Ptolemies on 
the Isle of Pharos. The wrought stone of which it was constructed 
was adorned with columns, balustrades, eto., of the finest marble. 
The tower, protected by a sea-wall, stood about four hundred feet 
high, and its light could be seen over forty miles. 

The Colossus of Rhodes was a hollow bronze statue of Apollo, one 
hundred and five feet high, near the Rhodian harbor. An inner wind- 
ing staircase led up to the head. It was overthrown by an earthquake 
(224 B. c). The Delphic oracle having forbade its reerection, it lay 
in ruins for over nine centuries, when it was sold by the Saracens to a 
Jew, who, it is said, loaded nine hundred camels with the metal. 

The Seven Wise Men were variously named even in Greece. The 
following translation of a Grecian doggerel gives one version : — 

" I'll tell the names and sayings and the places of their hirth 
Of the Seven great ancient Sages, so renowned on Grecian earth. 
The Lindian Cleobulus said, ' The man was still the hest ;' 
The Spartan Chilo, ' Know thyself,' a heaven-born phrase confessed; 
Corinthian JPeriander taught ' Our anger to command ; ' 
• Too much of nothing,' Fittacus, from Mitylene's strand ; 
Athenian Solon this advised, ' Look to the end of life ; ' 
And Bias from Priene showed ' Bad men are the most rife ; ' 
Milesian Thales urged that ' None should e'er a surety be; ' 
Few were these words, but, if you look, you'll much in little see." 

CoUins's Ancient Classics. 



HISTORICAL RECREATIONS. 

ANCIENT PEOPLES. 

1. How did a workman's scribble, made thousands of years ago, 
preserve a royal name, and link it to a monument? 

2. What king ordered the sea to be whipped because the waves 
had injured his bridges ? 

3. Who among the ancients were the greatest sailors ? Who had 
a religious horror of the sea ? 

4. What kings took a pet lion when they went to war? Who once 
took eats and dogs ? Who used elephants in battle ? Camels ? Scythed 
chariots ? 

5. What is the oldest book in the world ? 

6. Compare the character of an Egyptian and an Assyrian; an 
Egyptian and a Chinaman ; a Babylonian and a Persian. 

7. What king was so overwhelmed by his successes that he prayed 
for a reverse ? 

8. What Eoman emperor gave up his throne to enjoy his cabbage- 
garden? 

9. What emperor once convened the senate to decide how to cook 
a fish? 

10. Who gained a kingdom by the neighing of a horse? 

11. Who is the oldest literary critic on record? 

12. What was the "Dispensary of the Soul"? 

13. Who was the " Egyptian Alexander the Great " ? 

14. What statue was reported to sing at sunrise ? 

15. Which of the earliest races is noted for intellectual vigor? For 
religious fervor? For massive architecture? 

16. What is the "Book of the Dead"? The Zend-Avesta? The 
Epic of Pentaur? The Eig-Veda? 

17. Who hadapalaceat Nimroud? AtKoyunjik? AtKhorsabad? 
AtPersepolis? At Luxor? At Karnak? At Susa? 

18. Compare the character of a Spartan and an Athenian ; a Ro- 
man and a Greek. 

19. What people made the intoxication of their king an annual 
display? 

20. What city was called the "Daughter of Sidon and the Mother 
of Carthage"? What was the "School of Greece"? The "Eye of 
Greece"? The ''Seven-hilled City"? 

21. What king had a servant remind him three times a day of a 
proposed vengeance ? 

22. Who fought and who won the battle of Marathon? Platasp* 
Thermopylae? Salamis? Himera? Mycale? 

23. Who were the Cyclops? 



HISTORICAL RECREATIONS. ill 

24. Where and when were iron coins iised as currency? Gold and 
silver rings ? Engraved gems ? 

25. Who was Asshurbanipal? Tiglath-Pileser? Khufu? Seti? 
Asshur-izir-pal? Sennacherib? Cyrus? Cambyses? 

26. Which do you think w^as the most religious nation? The most 
warlike? The most patient? The most intellectual? The most ar- 
tistic ? 

27. Where were animals worshiped? The sun? The planets? 
The elements? Vegetables? The Evil Spirit? 

28. Who built the Great Wall of China? The Great Pyramid? 
The Labyrinth? 

29. How were women treated in Egypt? In Assyria? In Persia? 
In Athens? In Sparta? In Rome? 

30. Who was Buddha? Sebak? Pasht? Thoth? Bel? Ishtar? 
Moloch? Asshur? Ormazd? Nin? Nergal? Baal? 

31. How many Assyrian and Babylonian kings can you mention who 
bore the names of gods? 

32. How did a Babylonian gentleman compliment the gods? 

33. What does the word PharaoJi or Plirali mean ? Ans. According 
to some authorities it means tlie sun, from the Egyptian " ph-Ea ; " by 
others it is derived from "pe-raa," grand house, a title corresponding 
to our " Sublime Porte." 

* 34. Who was the " Religious Conqueror"? 

35. What were the Pools of Peace ? The realms of Hades ? 

36. Who was Che Hwang-te? Nebuchadnezzar? Darius? The 
Last of the Ptolemies ? 

37. Who was the ''False Smerdis"? 

38. Who were the Accadians, and where did they live ? 

39. What city was captured during a royal revelry? 

40. What nations believed in the transmigration of souls ? 

41. When was the Era of Nabonassar? The First Olympiad? The 
age of Pericles? 

42. What famous story is related of Cornelia, the mother of the 
Gracchi? * 

43. Mention the ornaments worn by gentlemen in ancient times. 

44. Who was the real Sardanapalus ? Sesostris? 

45. What religion teaches that the vilest insects and even the seeds 
of plants have souls? 

46. What poem is called the "Egyptian Iliad"? 

47. What Roman emperor resembled Louis XI. of France in 
character ? 

48. Who was Herodotus? Manetho? Thucydides? Livy? Xeno- 
phon? Tacitus? Sallust? Ceesar? 

49. What is meant by ''seceding to the Sacred Mount"? 



IV HISTORICAL RECREATIONS. 

50. What great war was begun through helping some pirates? 

51. What nation considered theft a virtue ? 

52. What Greek was called by Solon ''a bad imitation of Ulysses "? 

53. What was the original meaning of slave f Of tyrant? 

54. Who sculptured the famous Niobe Group? 

55. What are the "Elgin Marbles"? 

56. Who were the "Lost Tribes"? 

57. A great king married the "Pearl of the East." Who was he? 
Who was she? Why did he marry her? 

58. Who were the Perioeki? The Helots? The Spartans? The 
Dorians? The lonians? The Hellenes? j^ 

59. What is meant by " taking Egerean counsel " ? ^U 

60. What was the Amphictyonic Council? The Council of the 
Elders ? The Court of Areopagus ? 

61. Name the principal battles of the Persian warsj the Punic 
wars. 

62. Who engaged in the Messenian wars ? 

63. What were the Seven Wonders of the World? 

64. Name the Seven Wise Men, with their mottoes. 

65. What Roman emperor amused himself by spearing flies ? 

66. Who were the "Five Good Emperors" of Eome? 

67. Name the most important Egyptian kings. What can you tell 
about them? 

68. Describe the ceremonies of the Magi. 

69. How many relics found in tombs can you mention? 

70. What is the Rosetta stone? The Behistun Inscription? 

71. Describe the Homa ceremony. 

72. What was the Apis? "The Lights"? 

73. Tell what you can of the Memnonium; the Colosseum; the 
Ramesseum; the Colossus of Rhodes; the Hanging Gardens of 
Babylon ; the Great Sphinx. 

74. Who was the greatest builder among the Pharaohs ? 

75. What country forbade its priests to wear woolen undergarments? 

76. Compare the dress and ceremonies of an Egyptian priest and 
a Roman flamen. 

77. Where was the Parthenon? The Palace of the Csesars? The 
Erechtheium ? The " Temple of the Sphinx " ? 

78. What people had no sacred books ? 

79. Who were the greatest borrowers among the ancients? 

80. What is the difference between hieroglyphics and cuneiform 
writing? What peoples used them? 

81. What people used to write on the shoulder-bones of animals? 

82. Mention all the writing implements you can remember, and the 
peoples who used them. 



HISTORICAL RECREATIONS. V 

83. Who was Pindar? Simonides? Horace? Sappho? Hesiod? 
Anacreon? 

84. When was an army driven with whips to an assault? 

85. Who was ^'Little Boot"? 

86. Give the origin of the word Vandal. 

87. How did a ray from the setting sun once save a city? 

88. What king sat on a marble throne while reviewing his army? 

89. What emperor once lighted his grounds with burning Chris- 
tians ? 

90. What people wore a golden grasshopper as a head-ornament? 
What did it signify? 

91. Describe the Alexandrian Museum and Library. 

92. What was the Athenian Lyceum? The Academy? 

93. What Greek philosopher kept a drug-store in Athens? 

94. Describe the building of a pyramid. 

95. What is the oldest account of the Creation? Of the Deluge? 
In what language were they written? 

96. How many great men can you name who died in prison? Who 
were assassinated? Who voluntarily committed suicide? Who were 
sentenced by law to kill themselves ? 

97. What Greek poem was found under the head of a mummy? 

98. What king began his reign by glorifying his father, and ended 
it by erasing his father's name from the Temple walls and substituting 
his own? 

99. Mention the twelve great Grecian gods, with their attributes. 

100. What was the kinship of Isis, Osiris, and Horus, according to 
Egyptian mythology? 

101. Where did people ride on a seat strapped between two 
donkeys ? 

102. What great Greek philosopher was an oil speculator? 

103. Who were the Cynics? 

104. Describe a Chaldean home. 

105. What people buried their dead in stone jars? Who embalmed 
their dead? Who buried them in honey? Who exposed them to wild 
beasts? Who burned them? Who covered them with wax before 
burial? Who made feasts for them? Give the post-mOrtem travels of 
Rameses H. 

106. Describe the education of an Egyptian boy. A Persian boy. 

107. Who were the "Ten Thousand Immortals"? 

108. Describe a Persian military march. 

109. Who invented the alphabet? 

110. What happened in Egypt when a cat died? A dog? 
1X1. Describe an Assyrian lion-hunt. 



"Vi HISTORICAL RECREATIONS. 

112. Wliat nation excelled in sculptured bas-relief? In brick-enamel* 
ing? In bronze and marble statuary? In gem-cutting? 

113. Compare Egyptian and Assyrian art ; religion j literature. 

114. Describe an Assyrian royal banquet; a Persian banquet of 
mne. 

115. What national architecture was distinguished by pyramids and 
obelisks ? By tall, slender pillars and elaborate staircases ? 

116. What nations built their houses on high platforms? 

117. Describe the education of a Spartan boy; an Athenian; a 
Roman. 

118. How did the Assyrians go to war? 

119. Who was called the " Third Founder of Rome "? 

120. How many times in Roman history was the Temple of Janus 
closed? Ans. Eight. 

121. What city was entitled "The Eldest Daughter of the Empire"? 

122. Who boasted that grass never,grew where his horse had trodden? 

123. What did Europe gain by the battle of Chalons ? 

124. Describe a Macedonian phalanx. 

125. Who were the "Tragic Trio " of Greece? The Historical Trio? 

126. What people covered the mouth of their dead with gold-leaf? 
Who provided their dead with money to pay their fare across the river 
Styx? Who furnished them with dates for refreshment in the spirit- 
world? Tell what you can of the Egyptian Ka. 

127. Describe the stationery of the Egyptians; the Assyrians and 
Babylonians ; the Persians ; the Greeks and Romans. 

128. Who made the first discovery of an Assyrian monument? 

129. What people used second-hand coffins? 

130. What nation eased the beams of their palaces with bronze? 
Who overlaid them with silver and gold? 

131. What modern archgeologist discovered the remains of ancient 
Troy? Describe Cesnola's discoveries ; Flinders Petrie's. 

132. How did Rameses II. and Asshurbanipal resemble each other? 

133. Describe the contents and one of the regulations of Asshur- 
banipal's library. 

134. Who is your favorite Greek? Your favorite Roman? 

135. What people loaded the roofs of their houses with earth as a 
protection from sun and rain? Who had roof -gardens? [In Italy and 
in the East roof -gardens are still common.] 

136. When and where were bronze and iron used for jewelry? 

137. In what country was it considered disreputable for a gentleman 
to walk the streets without a cane ? 

138. In what country did gentlemen wear cylinders on their wrists? 
For what did they use them? 



HISTORICAL RECREATIONS. vii 

139. How did the views of the Greeks and the Persians differ in 
regard to fire and cremation? 

140. Describe an Egyptian funeral ; a Greek ; a Roman. 

141. Who sowed corn over newly-made graves? 

142. Describe an Egyptian nobleman's home. 

143. Compare ^schylus, Sophocles, and Euripides. 

144. Who was Aristophanes? Menander? Plautus? Terence? 
Lucian? 

145. What people entertained a mummy as a guest at parties? 

146. Who were the Sargonidse? Sassanidae? Seleucidas? Alc- 
mseonidae ? Heraclidae ? 

147. Name the great men of the age of Pericles ; of the Augustan 



148. Describe a Theban dinner-party; a Greek symposium; a 
Roman banquet. 

149. How did an Egyptian fight? An Assyrian? A Babylonian? 
A Persian? A Greek? A Roman? 

150. Name ten great battles before the time of Christ. 

151. Describe a Spartan home ; an Athenian ; a Roman. 

152. What Egyptian king changed the course of a river in order to 
found a city? 

153. Describe the Magian rites. 

154. Tell what you can of a Roman Vestal. 

155. Who were the Three Graces? Three Fates? Three Hes- 
perides? Three Harpies? Three Gorgons? Three Furies? 

156. Describe the Nine Muses. 

157. For what was the Pnyx celebrated? The Areopagus? 

158. In what country was it considered unamiable for a wife to refuse 
to wear her husband's clothes ? 

159. What philosopher is said to have lived in a tub? 

160. What kind of table-napkins did the Greeks use? 

161. Who was the "Blind Bard"? The "Poet of the Helots"? 
The "Lame old Schoolmaster"? The "Lesbian Nightingale"? The 
"Theban Eagle"? The "Attic Bee"? The ''Mantuan Bard"? 

162. Who was called the "Light of Mankind"? 

163. What poets dropped their shield in battle and ran from danger? 

164. How many Greek poets can you name ? Latin poets ? 

165. What were the "Four Great Schools of Philosophy"? 

166. A great philosopher, when burlesqued in a famous play, 
mounted a bench that the audience might compare him with his ridic- 
ulous counterpart. Who was he? Who wrote the play? Were they 
friends ? 

167. In what city was cock-and-quail fighting enjoined hj law as aa 
^lstructive exhibition? 



Vlil HISTORICAL RECREATIONS. 

168. What Greek poet likened himself to a porcupine ? 

169. Who was Confucius? Lycurgus? Draco? ^sop? Solon? 

170. Describe the peculiar tactics that decided the battle of Mara- 
thon; Leuctra; Chseronea; CannsB. 

171. What were the Philippics? 

172. What great poets were linked with the battle of Salamis ? 

173. Where, and as a reward for what, was a wreath of olive con- 
ferred? Of parsley? Of laurel? Of pine? 

174. What great orator received a golden crown for his public 
services? 

175. What were the Eleusinian mysteries? What great poet is 
connected with them? Who was accursed for revealing them? 

176. What was a Greek trilogy? 

177. Who wrote a history named after the Nine Muses ? 

178. Who was Eucles? Cleisthenes? Leonidas? Pausanias? 

179. Compare the style of Xenophon and of Thucydides. 

180. Who was the first authenticated "reporter"? 

181. What philosopher was tried for atheism because he believed in 
one great God? 

182. Tell what you can of Pythagoras ; Socrates ; Plato ; Aristotle ; 
Zeno. 

183. Who was Cimon? Pericles? Aristides? Themistocles? 

184. Who was Mardonius? Xerxes? Miltiades? 

185. Describe a Babylonian wedding ; a Greek wedding ; a Roman 
wedding. 

186. Describe the Panathensea ; the Feast of Dionysus. 

187. Compare the Babylonian Sacees and the Roman Saturnalia. 

188. Who were Hippias and Hipparchus? Who was Pisistratus? 

189. Who was Cleopatra? Mark Antony? Brutus? Pompey? 

190. What great philosopher was born the year that Pericles died? 

191. What great historian died in the year of the " Retreat of the 
Ten Thousand"? 

192. Who formed the "First Triumvirate?" The Second? 

193. In what siege did the women braid their long hair into bow- 
strings ? 

194. Who were the Seven Sages? 

195. How did Hannibal lose an eye? 

196. On what field did the Macedonian phalanx fight its last battle? 

197. What was the characteristic of the first two centuries of the 
Roman republic ? 

198. How did the phrase "Romans and Quirites" arise? 

199. Describe a triumphal entrance into Rome. 

200. What were the Laws of the Twelve Tables? 
20X. Tell the story of the "liape of the Sabine§." 



HISTORICAL RECREATIONS. ix 

202. Who refrjs.ed a gift of land because he already possessed seven 
acres ? 

203. How did Hannibal once outwit Fabius? * 

204. Tell the story of the capture of Rome by the Gauls. 

205. In whal- battle were gold rings a part of the spoils? 

206. In what year did Nineveh fall? Babylon? 

207. During what battle did an earthquake occur without being 
noticed by the combatants ? 

208. What province was left to the Romans by will? 

209. What mathematician was killed in the midst of a problem? 

210. Who was Pliny the Younger's dearest friend? 

211. What famous general sat amid the ruins of a great city and 
quoted Homer? 

212. What warriors trimmed their hair on the eve of a battle? 

213. Distinguish between the different Scipios; the two Catos; 
the two Plinys. 

214. What poet was commemorated by the statue of a drunken old 
man? 

215. What general declared that the greatest joy he had in a victory 
was the pleasure his success would give to his parents? 

216. What emperor boasted that he found his capital of brick, and 
leftitof m&rble? 

217. What emperor wore a toga woven by his wife and daughters? 

218. Who were Alexander's favorite artists? Who was his tutor? 

219. What was the Roman Poor Law? 

220. How many Roman emperors were murdered? How many com- 
mitted suicide?' How many died a natural death? 

221. In what country were fat men suspected? 

222. What battle ended the Roman republic? 

223. What great philosopher died the same year with Demosthenes? 
Which was the elder? 

224. Describe ^^ A Day in Rome ; " a Roman home. 

225. Describe the different modes of publishing books in jancient 
times. Name the royal founders of ancient libraries. 

226. When was the Era of Martyrs? Of the Thirty Tyrants? 

227. What king had the title "Conqueror of Babylon" inscribed 
upon his signet-ring? 

228. Describe a morning in Nineveh. 

229. Tell something connected with Mount Olympus; Mount Par- 
nassus ; Mount Hymettus ; Mount Sinai ; Mount Pentelicus. 

230. How did his Roman citizenship help St. Paul? 

231. When did elephants win a battle? 

232. When did the Grecians fight in Italy? 

233. Who were the road-builders of antiquit^o^? 

B G H-36 



X HISTORICAL RECREATIONS. 

234. Show how the struggle of each petty Grecian state for autonomy 
prevented the unity and prosperity of Greece. 

*235. Compare the personal rights of man among the ancients with 
those that he enjoys among the Christian nations of to-day. 

236. Describe the mode of Rome's growth as a nation. 

237. What was the character of Rome's government over her 
provinces ? 

238. Under what emperor did all the provincials acquire Roman 
citizenship ? 

239. Explain the expression, ''Chseronea was the coffin, as Marathon 
was the cradle, of Hellenic liberty." 

240. What was the origin of the word politics ? Pagan ? 

241. Who first used the expression, " Delenda est Carthago" f 

242. Narrate the circumstances of the death of Archimedes. 

243. Describe the three popular assemblies of Rome. 

244. How did the Romans procure a model for the ships of their 
first fleet? 

245. What hostile general once threw a javelin over the walls of 
Rome? 

246. Who said, "It is easier to turn the sun from its course than 
Fabricius fi-om the path of honor " ? 

247. Tell the story of Lucretia ; Virginia ; Horatius Codes ; Mycins ; 
Romulus and Remus ; Coriolanus ; Cincinnatus ; Camillus j Marcus 
Manlius ; Quintus Curtius ; Decius ; Caius Pontius. 

248. Name the twelve Csesars. 

249. • For what is the date 146 B. c. noted? 

250. Describe the funeral of a Roman emperor. 




vm 



INDEX 

AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY. 

*** The figures refer to the page number. 



Note. — Diacritical marks are as follows : a, e, I, 6, u, are long ; &, S, %, 6, H, short, 
as in dm, met, in, on, Up; a, a, d, a, as in cdre, arm, ask, all ; ii as mfull; eas in term; 
e as in there ; g like s ; g like^*; -eh like k; § like z; i^ as in thine. 



Abrani in Canaan, 80 ; in Egypt, 39. 

Aby'dus, temple of, 18. 

Academy at Athens, the, 175, 282. 

Ac'cad, 45, 46. 

Acca'dian, the, 45. 

Achse'an League, the, 157. 

Achseans, conquest of, by Dorians, 117. 

Achaia (a-ka'ya), province of, 237. 

Achilles (a-kil'leez), 116, 190. 

Acr6p'olis, 123, 128, 145, 180-182, 187, 194. 

Actium (ak'she-tlni), battle of, 254. 

^'diles, Roman, 271. 

^g6sp6t ami, battle of, 145. 

^ne'as, 117, 205. 

^ne'id, the, 117, 275. 

^-o'li-an War, the, 116. 

^-6ric Colonies, 118. 

^'quians, the, 220. ^ 

^schines (es'ki-neez) , 173. 

^schylus (6s'ki-ms), 127, 165, 168, 192. 

^sop (e'sOp), 173, 174. 

Aetius (a-e'shi-tis) at Chalons, 268. 

^to'li-an League, 157. 

^tolians, the, at Thermopylae, 237. 

Africa, 19. 

Agameni'non captures Troy, 116. 

Agath'o-cle§, tyrant of Sicily, 79. 

Aggsila'us, King of Sparta, 146. 

A'gis, King of Sparta, 179. 

Ag'ora, the Athenian, 182. 

Agrarian Law, 216. 

Agrio'ola conquers Britain, 260. 

Agrigen'tum, capture of, 227. 

Agrip'pa, 214, 298. 

Agrippina (a-grip-pi'nay 259. 

A'hab, 48. 

A'haz, 49. 

Ahriman (ah'ri-man), Persian god, 98. 

Aix (aks), battle of, 242. 

Al'aric the Goth, 267. 

Al'ba Lon'ga, 205, 209. 

Al^se'us, Greek poet, 164. 

Alpibl'a-deg, 141, 143, 144, 175. 

Alc-maj-bn'idse, the, 123, 124. 

Alexander the Great, 150-152, 177. 

Alexander Seve'rus, 262, 

Alexandria, 151, 154. 

AUia, 221. 

Alphabet, 77, 113. 

Al'tis, the Greek, 181, 186. 

Am'broge. See Christian Fathers. 



Amenemhe (a-men-em'6) III., 39. 

AmphlctyDn'ic Council, 115, 149. 

Amphitheater, Flavian (Colosseum), 284. 

Am'unoph III., 17. 

Anab'asis, the, 172. 

Anac'reon, 164. 

AnaxS,g'oras, 167, 174. 

Anaximan'der, 174. 

Androni'cus, Livius, 273. 

Antar9idas, Peace of, 146. 

An'ti-5€h, 155, 237. 

Anti'o-«hus the Great, 234, 237. 

Antip'ater, 150. 

Antis'theneg, 177, 194, 

An'tonincs, age of the, 261. 

Antoninus, Marcus, 261. 

Antoninus, Pius, 261. 

An'tony, Mark, 251-254, 

Apel'leg, 155, 183. 

Ape pi II, , 80. 

Aphrodi'te, 184. 

A'pis, 31. 

ApSl'lo (Apollon), 184. 

Apollodo'rus, Greek painter, 182, 

Apollo'nius, Greek poet, 155. 

Ap'pian Way, the, 283. 

Ap'pius Clau'dius, 217, 283. 

Aqueducts of Rome, 282. 

Arbe'la, battle of, 151. 

Arch of Constantine, 284 ; of Severus, 284 ; 

of Titus, 284. 
Ar€liida'mus, 140, 141. 
Ar«hiro€hus, 163. 

Archimedes (ar-ki-me'deez), 155, 234. 
Architecture, See AH. 
Ar'^hons, Athenian, 121. 
A-re-5p'agus, court of, 122, 194. 
A're§ (Mars), god of war, 184, 192. 
Argonautic Expedition, 115. 
Ar'g6s, 117, 146. 
Aria or Iran, 10. 
Ariad'ue, 185. 
A'rianigm, 265, 266. 
Aristi'deg, 128, 129, 132, 135. 
Aristode'mus, 193. 
AristCph'aneg, 155, 169, 175, 199, 
AristSt'le, 150, 176, 177, 194, 
A'rius, 265, 
Arminius, 256. 

Armor, See Military customs. 
Arsa'gidse, the, 156, 



(xi) 



xu 



INDEX. 



Art, Assyrian and Babylonian, 55, 71, 72, 
113, 413 ; Chaldean, 64. 65, 71 ; Chinese, 
110 ; Egyptian, 26, 44 ; Greek, 137, 145, 
154, 158, 180, 193, 194, 201 ; Hebrew, 85 ; 
Hindoo, 105 ; Persian, 96, 104 ; Phceni- 
cian, 77 ; Roman, 281, 285, 305, 310. 

Artaxerxes (ar-taks-erks'eez), 135, 145. 

Artaxerxes (Babegan), 156. 

Ar'temis, 184, 189, 194. 

Arts and Inventions, Assyrian and Baby- 
lonian, 48, 59, 71, 72; Chaldean, 64; 
Chinese, 111 ; Egyptian, 28, 44 ; Greek, 
183 ; Hebrew, 85 ; Hindoo, 105 ; Persian, 
97, 104 ; Phoenician, 77 ; Roman, 282, 
810. 

Ar'yan race, 10-13, 51, 88, 89, 105, 114, 204. 

Asca'nins, son of ^neas, 205. 

Aspa'sia, 167. 

Assemblies, Congregation of Israel, 86 ; 
Greek, 116, 194 ; Roman, 208, 212, 215 
(see Comitia). 

As'shur, Assyrian god, 62 ; emblem of, 98. 

Asshurban'ipal, 49, 54, 67, 69, 70. 

Asshur-e-med'i-lin (Saracus), 47, 50, 55. 

Asshur-i'zir-pal, 48. 

Assyria, 17, 46-70, 88, 89. 

Astar'te (Ash'ta-r6th), 79. 

Astrologers, 52, 56, 288, 290. 

Asty'age§, 88. ' 

Athena, 180, 181, 184, 187, 194. 

Athenian art, 123, 181-183 ; constitution 
(of Solon), 122 ; democracy, 119, 124, 139, 
159 ; education, 178 ; homes, 195 ; kings, 
121; literature, 123, 161-172; Panath- 
enaic procession, 187 ; respect for 
Pericles, 140, 141 ; schools closed, 157; 
schools of philosophy, 175-177 ; senate, 
123 ; supremacy, 134 ; symposia, 197- 
199; theaters, 170, 187-189; tyrants, 123. 

Athenians, the, 134, 137, 138, 159, 170, 179, 
194, 197, 201. 

Athens, 119, 121-140, 144, 146, 157, 158, 194. 

At'talus, 237. 

Attic wit, 199. 

At'tica, 121, 124, 143, 176. 

At'tila, 267, 268. 

Augm-s, Roman, 205, 208, 251, 293. 

Augustan age, the, 256, 310. 

Augtis'tulus ROm'ulus, 269. 

Augustus Caesar, 252-258, 296, 298. 

Aure'lian, 263. 

Av'entine Hill, 205, 208, 209, 214, 217. 

Baal, 78. 

Baalbec (bal-b6k'), 75, 28L 

Babel, Tower of, 55. 

Babylon, 46, 50, 51, 58, 89. 

Babylonian art, 55 ; curious customs, 63 ; 
empire, 45, 46, 50 ; literature, 54, 55, 
71 ; religion, 61 ; scene, 63 ; writing, 52. 

Bac'€hus (Diony'sus), 185, 187. 

Bac'tria, 10, 93. 

Basil'icas, Roman, 281. 

Behis'tun Inscription, 53, 90. 

BelshSz'zar, 51. 

Beni Hassan, tombs of, 40. 

Bero'sus, 46. 

Bethho'ron, Joshua at, 82. 

Bias. See Seven Sages. 

Bible, the, 85, 154, 226. 



Boe-6'tian League, 139, 147. 

Book of the Dead, Egyptian, 24. 

Borsip'pa, Temple of Nebo at, 55. 

Brahma and the Brahmans, 105-107. 

Bren'nus, Gallic leader, 156. 

Britain, 249. 

British Empire, 587 ; museum, 52, 55, 60l 

181. 
Brutium, 203, 233. 
Brutus, L. Junius, 211, 212. 
Brutus, M. Junius, 251-253. 
Bubas'tis, 26. 

Buddha (bood'da), 107, 111. 
Burial customs, 32-35, 43, 63, 65, 71, 99, 

104, 190, 191, 294, 307. 
Byzan'tine Empire, the, 266, 269. 
Caesar, Caius (ka'yus). See Caligula. 
Caesar, Julius, 248-252, 280, 298, 302. 
Cairo (ki'ro), 21. 
Calendar, 155, 222, 250, 251. 
Calends, Ides, and Nones, 251. 
Calig-'ula, 259, 303. 
Callim'a^hus, 181. 
Calli'o-pe. See Muses. 
Calpur'nia, 251. 

Calydo'nian Boar, hunt of the, 116. 
Camby'se§, King of Persia, 15, 90. 
CamU'lus, 221-223. 
Campus Mar' tins, 222, 299, 301, 308. 
Can'nse, battle of, 232. 
Canule'ian Decree, 218. 
Capitoline Hill, 206, 208, 222, 296, 307; 

museum, 183. 
Capua, 203, 233. 

Caracal'la, or Caracallus, 262, 285. 
Carchemish (kar'kee-mish), 87. 
Carthage, 73, 76, 227-235, 244, 250, 269. 
Carthagin'ians, the, 133, 227-235. 
Cassius (kash'e-us), Caius Longi'nus, 251- 

253. 
Cassius, Spurius, 216. 
Castes, Chaldean, 52 ; Hindoo, 105. 
Castor and Pollux, 213, 296. 
Catiline's Conspiracy, 247, 275. 
Cato the Censor, 235, 274, 289. 
Cato the Stoic, 248, 250. 
Cauca'sian race, the, 10. 
Caudine Forks, battle of, 223. 
Ce'crops, 121. 
Celts, the, 12. 

Censors, Roman, 218, 256, 271. See Cato. 
Centuries. See Assemblies. 
Cerami'cus, the, 140, 177. 
Cerberus, 184. 
Ce're§. See Demeter. 
Cesno'la, Luigi Palma di, 77, 87. 
Chserone'a, battle of, 149. 
Chalde'a. See Babylon. 
Chalons (sha-lon'), battle of, 268. 
Chompollion (sham-pdl'e-on), Francois. 

22. 
Che Hwang-te, 109. 
Cheops (ke'ops), 16, 36, 37. 
Chilo (ki'lo). See Seven Sages. 
China, 109-112. 
Chios (kl'Os), 139. 
Chivalry, 410-412, 439. 
€horagic Monument, 181, 194. 
€hora'gus, Greek, 188. 



tt' 



INDEX. 



Sill 



Christ, 257, 259, 310. 

Christian Church, the, 265 ; Fathers, 155. 

Christianity, 263, 265. 

Christians, the, 260, 262-264. 

Cicero, 157, 236, 247, 248, 253, 274, 296, 303, 
310. 

Cimbri, 242, 244. 

Ci'mou, 136, 141. 

Cincinna'tiis, 220. 

Ciu'eas, ambassador to E>oine, 225. 

Cinna, 244. 

Circus Flaminins, 299. 

Circus Maximus, 208, 297. 

Cisalpine Gaul, 204. 

Cities, Christianized, 263 ; free, 383, 392. 

Civilization, Aryan, 12 ; Assyrian and 
Babylonian, 51, 71 ; Chinese, 110 ; 
Egyptian, 19, 43 ; Greek, 119, 158, 201 ; 
Hebrew, 85 ; Hindoo, 105 ; Persian, 92, 
103 ; Phoenician, 77 ; Roman, 270, 309. 

Clau'dius, Emperor, 263. 

Cleis'theneg, or Clis'theneg, 124. 

Cleobu'lus. See Seven Sages. 

Cle'on, 141, 170, 172. 

Cleopa'tra, 155, 249, 253, 254, 285, 303. 

Clients, Roman, 207, 213, 270, 298. 

Cli'o. See Muses. 

Cloa'ca, Roman, 208. 

Cloe'lia, 213.- 

Clyde, Lord. See Campbell. 

Cnidus (ni'dus), 146, 181, 183. 

Co'cleg, Horatius, 212. 

Code, Buddhist, 107, 108; Draco's, 121 
122; Laws of the Twelve Tables, 217 
280 ; Mosaic, 85, 86 ; Servian Constitu 
tion, 212 ; Solon's Constitution, 122, 123 
Zoroastrian, 93. 

Co'drus, 121, 176. 

Coe lian Hill, 207. 

CoUati'nus, husband of Lucretia, 211. 

Colleges. See Universities and Education. 

Colosse'um, the, 260, 284, 292. 

Comitia Centuriata, 212, 215. 

Comita Curiata, 208, 215. 

Comita Tributa, 215. 

Commerce, Assyrian and Babylonian, 59, 
60 ; Chinese, 110 ; Greek, 118, 154, 159, 
200; Hebrew, 85; Hindoo, 105; Persian, 
92, 97 ; Phoenician, 73-77, 118 ; Roman, 
298, 305. 

Com'modus, 261. 

Commonwealth, Hebrew, 85. 

Confederations, 134, 206. 

Confucius (kon-f u'she-ils). 111. 

Co'non, Greek admiral, 146. 

Con'stantine the Great, 264, 265. 

Constantinople, 181, 265, 266, 269. 

Consulship, Roman, 213, 218, 256, 265, 307. 

Corcy'ra, 139. 

Corinth, 117, 236, 237, 250. 

Corinthian, capital, 181, 182, 281. 

Coriola'nus (Caius Marcius), 219. 

Cornelia, 241. 

Councils, Amphictyonic, 115, 149 ; eccle- 
siastical, 265 ; of Elders, 116 ;. of Nice, 
265. 

Crassus, 245-249. 

Croesus (kree'sus), 89. 

Cumse'an sibyl, 209. 



Cunax'a, battle of, 145. 

Cuneiform writing, 53, 65, 92. 

Curatii, 207. 

Cu'reg, 206. 

Cu'rise, Roman, 211, 270. 

Cu'rieg. See Assemblies. 

Cur'ti-us, Mettius, 206. 

Cyax'areg, 50, 88. 

Cy'clops, 114. 

Cy Ion, 123. 

Cyn'ics, the, 177. 

Cynosar'geg, the, 194. 

Cynosceph'alse, battle of, 236. 

Cyprus, Di Cesnola at, 77, 87; settlement 
of, 73. 

Cyrus the Great, 51, 84, 88, 89, 125. 

Cyrus the Younger, 145, 172. 

Dacians, the, 261. 

Damascus, 49. 

Daniel, 84. 

Dardanelles (dar-da-n6lz'), 115. 

Darius (da-ri'us) I., 91, 125, 126, 129. 

Darius III., 151. 

David, Hebrew King, 83. 

De'bir, 77. 

Deb'orah, 82. 

Decem'virs, the, 216, 217. 

Decius, 262. 

De'los, 134. 

Delphi, temple at, 115, 124, 186. 

Demagogues, 141, 143, 170. 

Deme'ter, 184. 

DemOs'theneg, 149, 173. 

Denta'tus, 225. 

Dia'na. See Artemis. 

Dictatorship, Roman, 213, 219, 245, 246, 
250, 307. 

Dido founds Carthage, 76. 

Diocle'tian, 263, 264. 

Diodo'rus Sic'ulus, 15. 

Di6g'ene§, 177. 

Diony'sus, god of wine, 185, 187. 

Dodo'na, temple of Zeus at, 185. 

Domitian, Roman Emperor, 261. 

Dorians, migration of, 117, 119. 

Doric Colonies, 118. 

Draco, Laws of, 121, 122. 

Drusus, 256. 

Education, Assyrian and Babylonian, 55, 
71 ; Chinese, 111 ; Egyptian, 26, 44, 155 ; 
Greek, 137, 155, 157, 162, 163, 178, 201 ; 
Hebrew, 86 ; Persian, 94, 103 ; Phoeni- 
cian, 77 ; Roman, 257, 280, 286. 

Egeria, the nymph, 207. 

Egypt, 15-44, 50, 151, 154, 254. 

E'hud, 82. 

Elba, 570. 

Eleusin'ian Mysteries, 144, 165, 184. 

Eleusis, 165. 

Elgin marbles, 181, 187. 

Embalming. See Burial customs. 

En'nius, 273. 

Epaminon'das, 147, 148. 

Eph'esus, 117. 

Eph'ors, 120. 

Ep'ics, 25, 163, 273, 275. 

Epicure'ans, 177. 

Epicu'rus, 177. 

Epi'rus, 225. 



XIV 



INDEX. 



Equites (6k'wl-teez), 213, 240. 

Er'ato, 185. 

Eratos'theneg, 155. 

Ereehthe'ium, 194. 

Esarhad'don, 49. 

Esquiline Hill, 277, 281, 298. 

Ethiopia conquered by Egypt, 17. 

Etrus'oans, the, 204, 206, 208, 211. 

Eu'cleg, 1-27. 

Eumenes (u'm6-iieez), 23. 

Eunien'ideg (Furies), the, 185. 

Euphra'te§, the, 13, 45, 50, 58. 

Eurip'ideg, 168, 275. 

Eurynl'edon, battle of, 136. 

Euter'pe. See Muses. 

Exig'uus, 10. 

Exodus of the Jews, 82. 

Fabii (fa'bl-i), the, 218. 

Fa'bius, M., Eoman dictator, 230, 232. 

Fabri'cius, 225. 

Famine in Athens, 145 ; in Canaan, 39 ; 

in Egypt, 39; in Rome, 218, 220; in 

Russia, 599. 
Fates, the three, 185. 
Fayoom (fi-oom'), the, 32, 39, 162, 168, 192. 
Festivals, 30, 38, 62, 63, 92, 115, 150, 165, 

186, 201, 239, 290, 307. 
Fire, Great, in London, 507 ; in Rome, 

259. 
Fire-worship, 99. 
Flaniin'ius, 236. 
Fleece, the Golden, 115. 
Forum, Roman, 296, 298, 299 ; monuments 

in, 282, 284 ; uses of, 239, 281, 300, 308. 
Fucinine, Lake, 282. 
Ful'via, wife of Mark Antony, 253. 
Furies, the, 185. 
Ga'bii, capture of, 211. 
Ga'de§ (Cadiz), 73, 230. 
Gala'tia, 156. 

Galleys, Greek and Roman, 192, 224. 
Gallus, Roman Emperor, 262. 
Games and Sports, 38, 67, 186, 197, 250, 285, 

290, 310. 
Gauls, the, 220, 232, 250, 264. 
Genghis Khan ( j6n'gis kan), 109, 403. 
Genseric ( j6n's6r-ik), 269. 
German migrations, 266-269. 
German'icus, 256. 
Gid'eon, 82. 

Gizeh (ge'zS), 16, 18, 35. 
Gladiatorial games, 291 ; war, 245, 
Glass, 28, 44, 59, 71, 78, 302. 
Good Hope, Cape of, 19. 
Gorgons, the, 185. 
Goths, the, 262, 263, 266. 
Grac'€hi, the, 241. 
Gracchus, Caius, 241. 
Gracchus, Tiberius, 241. 
Graces, the three, 185. 
Grani'cus, battle of, 151. 
Greece, 113-203. See Athens and Sparta. 
Gunpowder, 111. 

Gylippus (ji-lip'us), Spartan general, 144, 
Ha'de§, 184. 

Ha'drian, Roman Emperor, 261. 
Halicarnas'sus, 183, appendix, i. 
Ha'lys, the river, 88. 
Hamil'car, father of Hannibal, 133, 230. . 



Hamit'ic race, 10, 13. 

Hannibal, 230-235, 237. 

Harpies, the, 185. 

Has'drubal, 233, 234. 

Hebe, 185, 

Hebrews, the, 18, 80-87. 

Hector, son of Priam, 116. 

Helen, wife of Menela'us, 116. 

Hel'las and the Helle'nes, 114, 115, 117. 

Hellespont, Alexander crosses the, 151. 

He'lots, Spartan, 119, 136, 160, 161. 

Hephses'tus, 184. 

Hera, 184, 189. 

Heraclei'dse, return of the, 117. 

Hercula'neum destroyed, 261. 

Her'culeg, Twelve Labors of, 115. 

Her'meg, 143, 184, 196. 

He'ro, Greek mathematician, 155. 

Herbd'otus, 15, 110, 167, 171, 192. 

Hesiod (hee'si-od), 163. 

Hes'tia, 184, 196, 310. 

Hi'ero, King of Syracuse, 227. 

Hieroglyphics, Egyptian, 22. 

Hills, plan of Roman, 210, 299. 

Him'era, battle of, 133. 

Hindoos, the, 105-108. 

Hippar'^hus, 123, 155. 

Hip'pias, 123. 

Hippoc'rateg, 174. 

Hiram, King of Tyre, 78. 

Hit'tites, the, 86. 

Homer, 116, 151, 162, 189, 192. 

Homes and home life, Athenian, 195 ; 

Chaldean, 63 ; Egyptian, 88, 40 ; Roman, 

302 ; Spartan, 193. 
Hono'rius, Roman Emperor, 267. 
Horace, Roman poet, 276, 310. 
Horatian Decree, 218. 
Horatii and Curatii, 207. 
Horus, Egyptian god, 30, 31. 
Huns, the, 109, 265. 
Hyksos, 17. 
Hypatia, 177. 
Hystas'peg, Darius, 53. 
Hiad, Homer's, 116, 151, 162. 
Iliad, the Egyptian, 26. 
Immortals, the Persian, 129, 130, 
India, 105-108, 152. 
Indo-European. See Aryan. 
Inscriptions, famous, 18, 22, 53, 90, 259. 
Institutes of Vishnu and Gautama, 108. 
Inventions. See Arts and Inventions. 
lonians, the, 117, 118, 119, 139, 
Ionic colonies, 117, 144. 
Ipsus, battle of, 153. 
Iran or Aria, 10. 
Israel, kingdom of, 82-84. 
Issus, battle of, 151, 
Isthmian games, 186, See Games. 
Italy, 203-312, 
Janiculiim, 212, 298, 
Janus, Temple of, 207, 287, 288. 
Jason, 115, 169. 
Jehu, 48. 

Jericho, captnre of, 82. 
Jerome, See Christian Fathers. 
Jerusalem, 50, 83, 84, 85. 
Jews, the. See Hebrews. 
Jordan River, 81, 82. 



INDEX. 



XV 



Joseph, 80. 

Joshua, 82. 

Jove. See Zetis. 

Judah, kingdom of, 84. 

Judea, 80-86. 

Judges, the, 82. 

Jugur'tha, 242-244. 

Julian, the Apostate, 265. 

Juno. See Hera. 

Jupiter. See Zeus. 

Ju' venal, 278. 

Ka, the Egyptian, 24, 38. 

Kar'nak, Great Temple of, 9, 17, 26. 

Khu-en-A-'ten, King of Egypt, 17. 

Khu'fu. See Cheops. 

Kshatriyas (ksha'tre-yas), 105. 

Labyrinth, Egyptian, 17, 39, 65. 

Lacedse'mon, 119, 132, 146. 

Laconia, 121, 158, 160. 

La're§ and Pena'te§, 289, 310. 

Latin League, 205, 213, 216, 224. 

Latium, 206. 

Lay'ard, Austen Henry, 55. 

Leo L, Pope, saves Rome, 269. 

Leon'idas at Thermopylae, 129. 

Leonidas of Tarentum, 171. 

Lep'idus, 253. 

Leuc'tra, battle of, 147. 

Libraries, 18, 45, 54, 55, 71, 106, 154, 156, 

157, 162, 177, 178, 274, 275, 278-280, 297, 

304. 
Licin'ian Rogation, 219. 
Linnse'us, 55. 
Livy, 277, 310. 
Lo'crians, the, 149. 

Long Walls, the, 138, 140, 145, 146, 194. 
Lost Tribes of Israel, the, 84. 
Lotus flower, 62. 
Lucil'ius, 274. 
Lu'cius Tarquin'ius, 209. 
Lucretia, 211. 

Lucul'lus, 246. , 

Lux' or, 26. 

Lyce'um, 157, 194, 282. 
Lycur'gus, 120. 
Lydia, 89, 125. 
Lysan'der, 145. 
Lysim'achus, 153. 
Lysip'pus, 174, 183. 
Macedonia, 46, 148, 157, 236. 
Msece'nas, 275, 277. 
Ma'gi, ma'gianigm, 97, 99. 
Magna Grsecia, 118. 
Magnesia, battle of, 237. 
Ma'go, 232. 
Magyars, the, 374. 

Mamertine Prison, 208, 242, 259, 307. 
Man'etho, 15, 155. 
Man'lius, Marcus, 222. 
Mantine'a, 148. 
Man'tua, 550. 
Mar'athon, battle of, 126. 
Marcius, Ancus, 208. 
Marcius, Caius (Coriolanus), 219. 
Marco Polo, 109. 
Marcus Aure'lius, 261. 
Mardo'nius, 126, 133. 
Mariette (ma-re-6t), 27. 
Ma'rius Ca'ius, 242, 243, 244, 248. 



Marriage customs, 63, 189, 292. 

Mars. See Ares. 

Marseilles (mar-salz), 118. 

Martyrs, era of, 263. 

Massila (Marseilles), 118. 

Maxim'ian, Roman Emperor, 263. 

Max'imus Fa'bius, 223. 

Mede'a, 169, 275. 

Me'dia, 88. 

Meg'acle?, 123. 

Megalop'olis, 147. 

Melea'ger, 116. 

Melpom'e-ne. See Muses. 

Mem'non, the vocal, 14, 17. 

Memno'nium, the, 26. 

Memphis, 15, 16, 27, 30, 31, 39, 40, 43, 90.. 

Menan'der, 170. 

Menela'us, 116. 

Me'ne§, 15. 

Mercury. See Hermes. 

Mesopota'mia, 17, 45. 

Messa'na, capture of, 227. 

Messe'nia, 121, 147. 

Messenian wars, 121, 136, 163. 

Metau'rus, battle of, 234. 

Met'tius Cur'tius, 206. 

Migrations, Era of Great, 266. 

Mll'an, 264. 

Mile'tus, 117. 

Military customs, 21, 60, 69, 101-103, 126, 
149, 191, 225, 271, 307, 309; roads, 
Roman, 282. 

Minep'tah, 17, 82. 

Miner'va. See Athens. 

Minu'cius, 221. 

Mithrida'te§ the Great, 243, 246, 247. 

Mithridat'ic wars, 243, 246. 

Mnemosyne (n6-m6s'e-nee), 185. 

Moeris (me'ris). Lake, 17, 32, 39. 

Moloch, 78, 79. 

Mons Sacer, 214, 217. 

Monuments. HeeArt. ' 

Mortgage-pillars, Greek, 123. 

Moses, 80, 82, 86. 

Mount Ath'os, 126. 

Mount Etna (Vulcan's Forge), 184. 

Mount Vesuvius, battle of, 223. 

Mounts Ossa and Pelion, 113. 

Mummies, 32, 33, 34, 35, 42. 

Mum'mius takes Corinth, 236. 

Mun'da, battle of, 250. 

Muses, the, 164, 171, 185, 195. 

Museums, Alexandrian, 154 ; British (Lon- 
don), 52, 56, 60, 181 ; Capitoline (Rome), 
183; Gizeh, 18; Louvre (Paris), 55; 
Turin, 41 ; Uffizi (Florence), 183 ; Vati- 
can (Rome), 181. 

Myc'a-le, battle of, 134. 

Nabona'dius, 51. 

Nabonas'sar, era of, 46. 

Nabopolas'sar, 50, 70. 

Nse'vius, 273. 

Nebuchadnez'zar, 50, 84, 

Ne'eho, 19. 

Ne'mean games, 186. 

Neo-Platonism, 177. 

Neptune. See Poseidon, 

Se'TO, 259, 278, 305. 

Ner'va, 261. 



XVI 



INDElJt. 



Nice (nees), or Nicaea (in Asia Minor), 

265. 
yi'^ias, Greek painter, 183. 
Nicias, Greek general, 143. 
Nile Valley, the, 13, 15. 
Nimroud, 48, 55, 59. 
Nin'eveh, 47, 50, 58. 
Nirvana (neer-va'na), 107. 
Nu'ma, Pompil'ius, 207. 
Numan'tia, siege of, 238. 
Nu'initor, 205. 
Octa'via, 254. 

Octavius. See Augustus Ccesar, 
Odoa'^er, Patrician of Italy, 269. 
Odyssey, the, 117, 162. 
(Edipus Trilogy, the, 167. 
Oligarchy, 117, 120, 146. 
Olym'pia, 115. 

Olympian games, 186 ; gods, 183. 
Omens, 185, 189, 196, 251. 
O'phir, 74. 

Oppert (op'grt), M., 53. 
Oracles, 167, 185. 
Or'niazd, 79, 93, 98. 
Osi'ris, 24, 31, 34, 42, 154. 
Os'tia, harbor of, 282, 284. 
Ostracism, 124, 129. 
Pacto'lus, the river, 89. 
Pal'atine Hill, 205, 206, 274, 281, 297, 302. 
Palestine, 46, 50, 82, 83, 153, 259. See 

Jerusalem. 
Palmyra, 75, 281. 
Panathense'a, the, 187. 
Pansa, house of, 304, 306. 
Pantheism, 106. 
Pantheon, 298. 
Papy'rus, 23. 
Parchment, 23, 156. 
Pariahs,- Hindoo, 106. 
Paris, son of Priam, 116. 
Parnas'sus, Mount, 185. 
Par'thenon, the, 180. 
Par'thia, 156, 249, 262, 309. 
Pasar'gadse, 96. 
Patricians, Roman, 213. 
Patro'cles, 77. 

Paul'lus, Roman general, 235, 236. 
Pausa'nias, 133-135. 
Pau'sias, Gr eek painter, 183. 
Pedagogues, 178, 194, 197, 280. 
Pelas'gians, the, 114. 
Pelop'idas, 147. 
Peloponnesian war, 139-145. 
Peloponnesus, 117, 121. 
Pena'teg. See Lares. 
Penel'ope, 117. 
Per'gamus, 23, 156, 237. 
Pgrian'der. See Seven Sages. 
P6r'icle§, 136, 140; events of age of , 135, 

137, 200. 
Perioe'ki, 119, 160. 
Peripatet'ics, the, 176. 
Persep'olis, 94, 151. 
Per'seus, 236. 
Persian Empire, 46, 88-104 ; wars, 125- 

134. 
Pe'trie, Flinders, Egyptologist, 39, 168. 
Phalanx, Macedonian, 149. 
Pharaohs, the. See Egypt. 



Phar'na^eg, 249. 

Phidias, Greek sculptor, 137, 181, 183, 

305. 
Philip II. of Macedon, 148-150. 
Philip III., 236. 
Philip'pi, battle of, 253. 
Philip'pics of Demosthenes, 149, 173, 202. 
Philis'tines, 82. 
Philosophy and philosophers, 25, 155, 157, 

175, 201, 274, 278. 
Phocians, the, 149. 
Phoenicia, 73-79 ; Greeks in, 138. 
Phtah-ho'tep, 25. 
Pilate, Pontius, 259. 
Pin'dar, Greek poet, 151, 164. 
Pirates, 246. 
Pisis'tratus, 123, 136. 
Pit'tacus. See Seven Sages. 
Platse'a, 127, 133, 141, 143. 
Plato, 160, 168, 175, 199. 
Plau'tus, 274. 

Plebeians, definition of, 213. 
Plln'y the Elder, 277. 
Pliny the Younger, 277. 
Plu'tareh, 177. 
Pluto. See Hades. 
Pnyx, the, 140, 194. 
Politics, derivation of name, 117. 
Pol'ycarp, 264. 
Polyhym'nia. See Muses. 
Pompeii (p5m-pa'yee), 260, 286, 300, 302. 
Pompey the Great, 245-249. 
Pontifex Maximus, 283. 
Pontifices (Pontiffs), College of, 289. 
Pontius, Caius, 223. 
Pontus, kingdom of, 156. 
Popes, power of the. See Papal Power, 
Porsen'na besieges Rome, 212. 
Portia, wife of Brutus, 253. 
Posei'don, god of the sea, 184. 
Postu'mius, 224. 
Praxit'eleg, 183, 305. 
Pri'am, King of Troy, 116. 
Pris'cus, Tarquin'ius, 208. 
Pro'bus, 263. 

Propon'tis (Sea of Marmora), 118. 
Propylse'a, 182. 

Protog'eneg, Greek painter, 183. 
Psammet'iehus, 18. 
Ptoremies, the, 153-155, 192. 
Punic wars, 227, 230, 235. 
Punishments, 52, 60, 86, 88, 91, 92, 101, 191, 

242, 245, 259, 260, 280, 286. 
Pydna, battle of, 236. 
Pyrrhus (pir'us), 224. 
Pythag'oras, 174. 
Pythian games, 186. 
Quakers. See Friends. 
Quintus Curtius, 223. 
Quirinal Hill, 208, 298. 
Quiri'teg, 208. 
Races, historic, 10, 13. 
Ram'ese§ II., King of Egypt, 18, 80. 
Ramesse'um, the, 26. 
Ram'ne§, 209. 
Rawlinson, Sir Henry, 53. 
Regil'lus, Lake, battle of, 213. 
Beg'ulus, 229. 
Re'mus, a05. 



INDEX. 



XVll 



Republic, Athenian, 124; Greek cities, 
118 ; Hebrew, 85 ; Roman, 213, 215, 223, 
308, 309. 

Rhapsodists, the Greek, 161. 

Rig-Veda, the Hindoo, 106. 

Ritual, the Egyptian. See Book of the 
Dead. 

Roads, Roman, 226, 282. 

Roman Empire, 46, 255, 257, 261, 269. 

Rome, 205-312. 

Romulus, 205. 

Rosetta stone, 22. 

Roxan'a ("Pearl of the East"), 152. 

Sabines, the, 206, 209. 

Sacred Band, 147 ; wars, Grecian, 149. 

Sacrifices, human, 79. 

Sagun'tum, capture of, 280. 

St. Paul, 260. 

St. Peter, 260. 

Sal'amis, battle of, 132. 

Sal'lust, 275, 310. 

Sama'ria, 49, 84. 

Sammur'amit, 48. 

Samson, 82. 

Samuel, 83. 

Sanskrit literature, 106. 

Sappho (saf'fo), 164. 

Sar'acus, 47, 50. 

Sardanapa'lus I., 48. 

Sardanapalus II., 49. 

Sardinia, 73. 

Sar'dis, 89, 125. 

Sar'gon, and the Sargon'idse, 46, 49. 

Sassan'idse, 93, 156. 

Sa' traps of Persia, 91. 

Sat-ur-na'lia, 239, 290, 295. 

Saul, 83. 

Scarabse'i, Egyptian, 30, 33, 41. 

Scenes in real life, 35, 63, 192, 296. 

Schliemann (shlee'man), 162. 

School, name derived, 179. 

Science, 28, 93, 111, 113, 173. 

Scipio Africanus Major, 234, 235. 

Scipio Africanus Minor, 235, 238. 

Scipio Asiaticus, 235, 237. 

Sco'pas, 183, 305. 

Seleucidee (se-lu'si-dee), the, 155, 237. 

Seleti'cus, 155. 

Semir'amis, 49. 

Semitic race, 10. 

Sempro'nius, 231. 

Sen'eca, 278, 305, 310. 

Senna€h'erib, 49, 57, 67. 

Senti'num, battle of, 224. 

Sep'tuagiut, 154. 

Serto'rius, 245. 

Ser'vius Tul'lius, 208. 

Sesorta'sens, the, 17. 

Ses6s'tris, 18. 

Se'ti (Minep'tah), 17. 

Seven Sages, 173, appendix i. 

Seven Wonders of the World, appendix i. 

Seve'rus, Alexander, 262. 

Severus, Septim'ius, 262, 282, 284. 

Sextil'ius, 244. 

Sex'tus, Tarquin'ius, 211. 

Shalmane'ger II., 48. 

Shalmaneser IV., 49. 

Shepherd kings, the, 17. 



Ships and boats, 38, 192, 227, 253. 

Sib'ylline books, 209. 

Sicily, 73, 118, 133. 

Si'don, 73, 78. 

Silk, 105. 

Sini6n'ide§, 168. 

Slaves and slavery, 18, 36, 37, 49, 60, 63, 
80, 86, 119, 160, 161, 179, 195, 197-199, 
214, 229, 239, 267, 274, 275, 280, 286, 290, 
292, 295, 298, 300, 30], 303, 306. . 

Slavs, the, 12, 13. 

Smerdis, son of Cyrus, 91. 

Smerdis the False, 90, 91. 

SOc'iateg, 159, 170, 172, 174, 197, 199. 

Solomon, 83. 

Solon, 89, 122, 123, 160, 190. See Seven Sages. 

sophists, the, 175. 

SDph'ocleg, 165, 166, 167. 

Sosig'eneg revises calendar, 155. 

Spain, 238. 

Sparta, 117, 119, 126, 139, 160, 192. 

Spar'tacus, 245. 

Spartans, 119, 129, 139, 141, 143, 160, 193. 

Spu'rius Mee'lius, 219. 

Statues, famous : ^sop, 174 ; Anacreon, 
164 ; Athena Polias, 194 ; Athena Pro- 
machus, 194; Bel, Beltis, and Ishtar, 59; 
Csesar, 250 ; Faun of Praxiteles, 183 ; 
Jupiter, the Capitoline, 250, 307 ; Mem- 
non, 14, 17 ; Niobe group, 183 ; Pallas 
Athena, 181 ; Pompey, 252 ; Rameses, 
26 ; Romulus and Remus, 205 ; Seven 
Sages, the, 174 ; Shafra, 37 ; Sheikhel- 
Beled, 27 ; Venus of Cnidus, 181, 183 ; 
Zeus, 181. 

Stiri€ho, 267. 

Stoics, the, 177. 

Stra'bo, 155. , 

Sudra (soo'dra), the Hindoo, 106. 

Sulla, 242-245. 

Sympo'sium, 198, 199. 

Syr'acuse, 118, 143, 144, 227, 233, 234. 

Syria, 46, 49, 50. 

Syrian war (Rome), 237. 

Ta^'itus, 277. 

Ta'o-i§m, 111. 

Taren'tum, attack on, 224. 

Tarpe'ia, treachery of, 206. 

Tarpe'ian Rock, 206, 223. 

Tarquin, 208-213. 

Tarquinii(quin'i-i), 212. 

Tar'shish, 74. 

Tarsus, Cleopatra at, 253. 

Tartars, the, 109. 

Templars. See Knights Hospitallers and 
Templars. 

Ten Thousand, retreat of the, 145. 

Ter'ence, 274. 

Terpsi€h'o-re. See Muses. 

Tertul'lian, 264. 

Teutons, 12, 13 ; defeated by Marius, 242. 

Thal'eg. See Seven Sages. 

Thap'sus, battle of, 250. 

The'aters, 170. 187-189, 284, 298, 336, 472. 

Thebes (theebz), Egypt, 16, 17 ; Greece, 
147, 149, 151. 

Themis'tocleg, 128, 129, 132, 135, 189. 

The5d'oric, 268, 318. 

Theodo'sius I. (the Great), 266. 



XVlll 



INDEX. 



Ther'mse, Roman, 285. 

Thermdp'ylse, 129, 237. 

The'se-us, 116. 

Thes'pis, 165. 

Thothmes (tbt'meez) I., of Egypt, 17. 

Thothmes III., 17. 

Thrace, Persians defeated at, 126. 

Thucydides (thu-sid'i-deez), 172. 

Ti'ber, the, 204, 205, 212, 250, 283. 

Tibe'rius, 256, 300. 

Ti'bur (Tivoli), 281. 

Tig'lathhiin, 47. 

Tisr'lath-Pile'seiL, 47. 

Tigiath-Pileser III., 49. 

Tigranes (ti-gra'neez), 246. 

Tigris-Euphrates basin, 13, 45. 

Ti'tus, Roman Emperor, 85, 260, 285. 

Tra'jan, Roman Emperor, 267, 292. 

Transmigration of souls, 24, 106, 174. 

Trasime'nus, battle of, 232. 

Tre'bia, battle of, 231. 

Tribunes, 214, 217, 218, 256. 

Tril'ogy, definition of, 165. 

Trio, historical, 171 ; tragic, 165. 

Tri'reme, 192. 

Trium'virate, First, 248 ; Second, 252. 

Trojan war, 116. 

Troy, 115, 116, 162. 

Tul'lus Hostil'ius, 207. 

Turanian peoples, 10, 46, 109. 

Twelve Tables, Laws of the, 217. 

Tyrants, 123, 133, 145, 170, 262. 

Tyre, 50, 73, 151. 

Tyrian dyes, 78. 

Tyrtseus (tir-tec'us), Greek poet, 163. 

Ulm (oolm), battle of, 562. 

Ul'philas, 266. 

Ulys'segj 117. 

Universities, Colleges, and Schools : Chi- 
nese, 111 ; Egyptian, 26, 44 ; Greek, 137, 
155, 157, 163, 178 ; Hebrew, 86 ; Roman, 
273, 275, 276, 280, 300. 



Ura'nia, muse of astronomy, 185. 

Uruch, the earliest Chaldean king, 64. 

U'tica founded, 73. 

Vaisya, the Hindoo, 106. 

Va'lens, defeat of, 266. 

Valerian Decree, 218. 

Vandals, 269. 

Var'ro, 232. 

Va'rus, massacre of, 256. 

Vedas (va'da§), the, 106. 

Ve-i-en'tiiie war, 218. 

Veil (ve'yi), 212, 218, 221. 

Vendidad, the Hindoo, 93. 

Venice, 269. 

Venus. See Aphrodite. 

Vercel'lse (v6r-ch61'lee), battle of, 242. 

Vespa'gian, 260, 294. 

Vesta, 310. See Hestia. 

Vestal virgins, 289. 

Vesu'vius, battle of, 223. 

Viminal Hill, 298. 

Virgil, 275, 310. 

Virginia, Roman maiden, 217. 

Vishnu, 106, 108. , 

Vulcan. See Hephcestus. 

Vullush III., 48. 

World-Empires, the, 46. 

Writing materials, 23, 43, 44, 52-54, 71 

92, 104, 177, 279, 280, 305. 
Xanthip'pus, Spartan general, 229. 
Xantippe (xan-tip'pe), 197. 
Xenocrates (ze-n5k'ra-teez), 157. 
Xenophon (z6n'o-fon), 47, 172. 
Xerxes (zerks'eez), 129, 130, 132, 133. 
Za'ma, battle of, 234. 
Zend-Avesta, 93. 
Ze'no, 157, 177. 
Zeno'bia, 263. 
Zeus (zus), 166, 180, 181, 184, 185, 186, 187, 

189, 196. 
Zeuxis (ztiks'is), 182. 
Zoroas'ter, 93. 



ESSENTIALS IN MEDIEVAL 
AND MODERN HISTORY 

From Charlemagne to the Present Day. By SAMUEL 
BANNISTER HARDING, Ph.D., Professor of Euro- 
pean History, Indiana University. In consultation with 
ALBERT BUSHNELL HART, LL.D., Professor of 
History, Harvard University 



THIS book is distinguished by the same vital pedagogical 
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Essentials in History Series. It is intended for a 
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^ The difficulties usually encountered in treating mediaeval 
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England are taken up in turn as each becomes the central 
figure on the world's stage. About a third of the book is 
devoted to the period previous to the Reformation; another 
third to modern history from the Reformation to the French 
Revolution; and the remainder to the century and a quarter 
since the occurrence of that great event. These proportions 
give an opportunity to discuss the greatness of England, the 
unification of Italy, and of Germany, and the present organiza- 
tion of Europe under the control of the concert of powers, on 
the same plane as the Crusades, or the Thirty Years' War, or 
the age of Louis XIV. 

•[y The three most difficult problems in mediaeval history — 
the feudal state, the church, and the rivalry between the 
empire and the church — are here discussed with great clear- 
ness and brevity. The central idea of the book is the develop- 
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and religion from the earlier condition of a world empire. 



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ESSENTIALS IN ENGLISH 
HISTORY 

From the Earliest Records to the Present Day. By ALBERT 
PERRY WALKER, A.M., Master in History, Eng- 
lish High School, Boston. In consultation with ALBERT 
BUSHNELL HART, LL.D., Professor of History, 
Harvard University 

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LIKE the other volumes of the Essentials in History Series, 
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problems: free and democratic home government, and prac- 
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(3) the extreme development of two great fields of industry, 
commerce and manufacture. The narrative follows the 
chronological order, and is full of matter which is as interest- 
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ESSENTIALS IN AMERICAN 
HISTORY 

From the Discovery to the Present Day. By ALBERT 
BUSHNELL HART, LL.D., Professor of History, 
Harvard University 

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and to supplement this by good illustrations and maps. 
Political geography, being the background of all historical 
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^ All sections of the Union, North, East, South, West, and 
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The book aims to make disdnct the character and public 
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are given in special sections of the text. Towards the end a 
chapter sums up the services of America to mankind. 




("9) 



OUTLINES OF GENERAL 
HISTORY 

By FRANK MOORE COLBY, M.A., recently Professor 
of Economics, New York University 



THIS volume provides at once a general foundation for 
historical knowledge and a stimulus for further reading. 
It gives each period and subject its proper historical 
perspective, and provides a narrative which is clear, con- 
nected, and attractive. From first to last only information 
that is really useful has been included. 

^ The history is intended to be suggestive and not exhaus- 
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<«s) 



A HISTORY OF ENGLISH 
LITERATURE 

By REUBEN POST HALLECK, M. A. (Yale), Louisville 
Male High School 



HALLECK'S HISTORY OF ENGLISH LITER- 
ATURE traces the development of that literature from 
the earliest times to the present in a concise, interesting, 
and stimulating manner. Although the subject is presented 
so clearly that it can be readily comprehended by high school 
pupils, the treatment is sufficiently philosophic and suggestive 
for any student beginning the study. 

^ The book is a history of literature, and not a mere col- 
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of an author's life are given to make students interested in 
him as a personality, and to show how his environment 
affected his work. Each author's productions, their rela- 
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in literature, receive treatment commensurate with their 
importance. 

^ One of the most striking features of the work consists in 
the way in which hterary movements are clearly outlined at 
the beginning of each chapter. Special attention is given to 
the essential qualities which differentiate one period from 
another, and to the animating spirit of each age. The author- 
shows that each period has contributed something definite 
to the literature of England, either in laying characteristic 
foundations, in presenting new ideals, in improving literary 
form, or in widening the circle of human thought. 
^ At the end of each chapter a carefully prepared list of 
books is given to direct the student in studying the original 
works of the authors treated. He is told not only what to 
read, but also where to find it at the least cost. The book 
contain? a special literary map of England in colors. 



INTRODUCTION TO 
AMERICAN LITERATURE 



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By BRANDER MATTHEWS, A.M., LL.B., Professor 
of Literature, Columbia University 



PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT, in an extended and ap- 
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has ever had in his hands. It is just the kind of book that 
should be given to a beginner, because it will give him a clear 
idea of what to read, and of the relative importance of the 
authors he is to read; yet it is much more than merely 
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derous tomes which contain what usually passes for criticism; 
and the principles upon which Mr. Matthews insists with 
such quiet force and good taste are those which must be 
adopted, not only by every student of American writings, 
but by every American writer, if he is going to do what is 
really worth doing. There is little room for division of 
opinion as to the excellence of Mr. Matthews' s arrangement 
as a whole, and as to the soundness of his judgments. He 
preserves always the difficult balance between sympathy and 
justice. . . .In short, Mr. Matthews has produced an 
admirable book, both in manner and matter, and has made a 
distinct addition to the very literature of which he writes." 
^ The book is amply provided with pedagogical features. 
Each chapter includes questions for review, bibliographical 
notes, facsimiles of manuscripts, and portraits, while at the end 
of the volume is a brief chronology of American literature. 



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COMPOSITION-RHETORIC 

^I.OO 

By STRATTON D. BROOKS, Superintendent of Schools, 
Boston, Mass., and MARIETTA HUBBARD, for- 
merly English Department, High School, La Salle, 111. 



THE fimdamental aim of this volume is to enable pupils 
to express their thoughts freely, clearly, and forcibly. 
At the same time it is designed to cultivate literary 
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^ The pupils are taught how to correct their own errors, 
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^ The modern character of the illustrative extracts can not fail 
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toward the end of the book there is a very comprehensive and 
compact summary of grammatical principles. More than usual 
attention is devoted to the treatment of argument. The ap- 
pendix contains the elements of form, the figures of speech, etc. 



THE GATEWAY SERIES 

HENRY VAN DYKE, General Editor 



Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice. Felix E. Schelling, University of 

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Shakespeare's Julius Caesar. Hamilton W. Mabie, "The Outlook." 

j^o.35. 
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NEW ROLFE SHAKESPEARE 

Edited by WILLIAM J. ROLFE, Litt.D. 
40 volumes, each, ^0.56 

THE popularity ofRolfe's Shakespeare has been extraor- 
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^ As teacher and lecturer Dr. Rolfe has been constantly in 
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CHEMISTRIES 

By F. W. CLARKE, Chief Chemist of the United States 
Geological Survey, and L. M. DENNIS, Professor of 
Inorganic and Analytical Chemistry, Cornell University 



Elementary Chemistry . $i.io 



Laboratory Manual . . j^o 50 



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OUTLINES OF BOTANY 

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By ROBERT GREENLEAF LEAVITT, A.M., of 

the Ames Botanical Laboratory. Prepared at the request 
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Edition with Gray's Field, Forest, and Garden Flora j^l.80 

Edition with Gray's Manual of Botany 2.^5 



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the use of the compound microscope where it is available. 



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ELEMENTS OF 
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B7 J. LAURENCE LAUGHLIN, Ph.D., Head Pro- 
fessor of Political Economy, University of Chicago 

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